Passages
by anamatics
Summary: Fifteen years after the Carnival of Fuuka it is calm, people have moved on with their lives. No one expects the phone call, the warning that their abilities have suddenly returned. Finally Complete!
1. Chapter 1

**Passages, Prelude & Chapter One **

_AN - This sort of popped into my head last night after reading some TOURS doujinshi. Somehow I decided that I wanted to a) write a story in the HiME-verse and b) write it far in that universe's future. I'm posting this to gauge interest and to see if I should go on.  
_

* * *

_It's been ten years since that day, almost to the date. Ten years since I ordered Duran's guns to fire one last time into the serpent-like grip of the monstrous Kiyohime. Ten years since I took my own life. _

_Death is one of those entities that has a sinking habit of sneaking up on you, whether you want it to or not, it's nearly impossible to prevent it from happening. There are stories about men who wanted to be immortal, they asked for things that no right-minded human would want - and the prices they paid were always far higher than they had expected. _

_I did not ask to live, nor did I ask to die. _

_It was simply a set of circumstances that I, and twelve others like me, were thrown into against our will. We were chosen at birth for the roles we placed in that fool's carnival - and our roles were all that mattered. After that we were brushed aside, our schooling and future employment completely taken care of in the single gesture of pity we were afforded. _

_We fucking died for them and all they could do was give us money. _

_I want my life back. _

_I want my life to return to the way it was before those bastards took away everything that I held dear. _

_They stole a year of my childhood and ten years of my life with one simple action. _

_My mother was hardly innocent, I know that now; but at the time my mind was too clouded by everything I refused to see. It was right in front of my eyes all along, I was just too blind to notice. _

_Such is the nature of my existence. _

_Mai, in her spare moments between her restaurant and Mikoto at university, tells me that I'm rather dense. I prefer to think of myself as a blunt person; people need to be blunt with me or I will miss the point entirely. _

_I'd hate to think that I'd missed the point of what happened to all of us. As far as I could tell, there was no point. We'd fought a battle because some higher power had wanted us to, and now we were expected to just go on living. _

_How does one go about living when you have seen death? I try to answer that question very day, and I find that there are no answers to it. I have seen what is at the end of the metaphorical tunnel. There's no white light, and it isn't pleasant - there's just nothingness and a feeling of isolation so powerful that you almost want to believe in God and Heaven to escape the dark. _

_I've never talked to anyone about what it was like to die. I was one of the few who faded away into nothingness, pulled by a girl who loves me more than life itself. _

_Mai doesn't understand that feeling, but she understands how the loss can affect a person. She lost so much in the battle, while I had already lost most of what I had before it even started. _

_The string the Fates cut for me was very different from the ones cut for the other twelve. We're all so very different - there's nothing we have in common save this carnival. _

_I sometimes wonder, how would I be, should the carnival had never taken place. I can't even begin to imagine it, I was angry then, and I'm angry now. _

_Shizuru says that I stress myself out, thinking about these things. _

_It's been ten years, however; and I can't stop dwelling on the past. I feel as though I'm still missing something important, a lesson I should have learned from those days that I haven't picked up on, yet._

* * *

_Five years later. _

The early morning sunlight filtered in though the western-style binds and cut through the darkness of the room with large slices of color that illuminated the room within. On a futon in one corner, a red-haired young woman lay curled up into a ball. It was as if she was trying to pull her body as far as humanly possible from the sunlight before wakefulness jolted her back onto this plane of reality.

She was having a nightmare, and her breath was coming in sort gasps as she tried to fight it off. Her fingers clawed at her futon, desperately seeking to hold onto something, anything to stay the pain of what she now felt. She needed to be whole again, not this half-life she was now living. The nightmare raged within her, and a fleeting thought passed through her mind: it was a good thing she had thrown that man out earlier. He didn't need to witness this.

No one did.

Her fingers were tearing into the futon now, coated in a strange glove of olive green and magenta. The mattress was nothing against the claws that the woman had long since forgotten she possessed - it was ripped to shreds almost without a second thought.

She twisted once again, rolling onto her back as she tried to escape the sensation of being chased, of being powerless, of knowing that what she held most dear to her would perish if she got it wrong.

These sorts of things were persistent, however, and the woman's forehead was covered in sweat by the time her alarm went off.

"Julia!" She shouted, sitting up abruptly.

She looked around the room, at her ruined mattress and disheveled bed. Why were the dreams back now? So many years had past since them, since the events they proceeded. Why were these thing happening again?

She switched off the alarm and stared a little more closely at her mattress. The marks were long and precise, as though they'd been done with a knife and not frantic fingernails.

Not that her nails were sharp enough to do that kind of damage, anyway. They were just pleasantly sharp, to give her bed-partners something to remember her by before she threw them out of the apartment.

Discovering sex had been a revelation for her, for it made men come to her like never before - and it made the eventual betrayal all the sweeter. Her mother called her 'loose' for what she did, and her friends joked about her insatiable sexual appetite.

Really, she would do anything to escape the memories of the game she so foolishly played as a girl. She'd been insane then, they all had been.

_A blood red blade descending down, a monster roaring up behind her. _

Some of them had been crazier than others.

Her mind again drifted back to that blood red blade, thinking of it was enough to fill her with more terror than her nightly trips down memory lane. It was an element, like her own, so powerful and so useless in this day and age. _What does a worker in Advertising need with a weapon like that? An element?_ She wondered, looking down at the long slices into her mattress. The man earlier had been the boring type, not adventuresome enough to be into blood play. It couldn't have been him, which left only her. A sense of fear gripped her as she tried to think of something - anything, that could have done the damage.

There was nothing.

The marks were made by the near-perfect weapons that she'd now found herself wishing for at every turn. Razor wire and knives, two perfect weapons that left men to be putty in her hands.

They were the only things that it could be. Shakily, the woman fumbled under her pillow for her cell phone and dialed a number from memory, a number that she did not dare to keep in the phone itself. Association with that sort of people was enough to lose her job if she wasn't careful. She had to be oh, so wary these days. One false step and she'd be back on the street, jobless and penniless again.

And considering by whose charity she was living now, that option almost seemed worth it.

She did not take favors from anyone.

"Kuga," A gruff and tired sounding voice said on the other line, "This had better be good."

The woman paused, wondering what Kuga would say when she spun her tale. "I summoned my elements last night, Natsuki."

Kuga did not say anything for a few drawn out moments. The woman could see her, sitting at her desk in that big corporate building she'd decided to work in, chewing on her thumbnail. Gone was the woman who had argued against the conviction that they were the same. They were both so very different now, Kuga and herself. Worlds apart as they struggled with their shared past. Kuga would always be one of those beautiful things forever out of her reach, claimed by another far more powerful than she.

The woman wasn't one to push her luck. She'd seen how far that could take her while she was still in middle school.

"You're lying, Nao." Kuga said at length. "It's a poor joke."

Nao frowned, "I have successfully decimated my mattress and all you can do is grunt out, 'you're lying'? Don't you get it, Kuga?" How could she explain to this incredibly dense woman that she was not joking.

"I see no other reason why you would call me, I'm just a ghost from your past now."

Nao found herself pouting slightly, she still came to Midori's 'HiME Sentai' gatherings every few months - and she came round to Mai's restaurant more often than not. "I see you enough to make you at least an apparition, Kuga. Ghost is a one time thing, we see far too much of each other for that."

"Whatever." Kuga sounded tired, very tired.

_Fujino must have kept her up all night again._ The thought came pleasantly to Nao, but the thought of the honey-haired woman filled her again with the same dread she'd been trying to avoid ever since she'd woken up.

"Look, I don't want to talk to you either, I just thought that you'd like to know." Nao spat into the phone, banishing all thoughts of Fujino from her mind with the simple anger that she'd long-since trained herself to fill her life with.

"Good, you told me, now leave me the fuck alone." Kuga's voice was harsh, but Nao was well-versed in Kuga's moods, she was annoyed, if not anything else. And intrigued.

_Gottcha. _


	2. Chapter 2

**Passages, Chapter Two**

_AN - The story progresses. I personally think that if Shizuru and Natsuki are getting into their fifteenth(or so) year together that some of the conversations that I'd imagine they'd be having are quite logical. After being monogamous and essentially married for that long, there are certain things that biology dictates any normal human would want. Not that I'm saying the HiME are normal humans, but there's certainly the biological imperative to reproduce and educate the next generation._

_Oh, by the way, I thought that I'd break the HiME-fic cliché and **not** have Shizuru go into business (or Medicine, but that was just that one fic)._

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. Thanks to Glowie for pointing out the error.**  
_

_centauri2002 - I wouldn't say that Natsuki's unhappy, she just has a lot of questions and she's working through them. If you didn't notice, there's a passage of time between the first section of each chapter and the second section. I'm just using that space to establish canon._

* * *

_Shizuru mentioned kids once, jokingly. I didn't know what to say to her - as it's not humanly possible for two women to have children. _

We could adopt_, she said,_ a nice little boy from China or Cambodia

_I like the idea of saving a child from places like that, as it has just gotten worse in recent years. _

_It's conversations like this that we have all the time. Silly and empty interactions that make us feel safer; maybe even make us feel better. We are treading on eggshells because we are scared of what we once did. I do it around Mai and Mikoto all the time, but it's painful when I have to do it around Shizuru. Isn't the intimacy of a lover supposed to supersede all other problems? _

_I just don't know. _

_I love her with all my heart, for I've been told that it's ingrained on my soul to love her soul. _

_Mai's a sentimental dolt like that. _

_But really, kids? _

_I know that Shizuru loves them, that's why she decided to not go into business like her family wanted her to. There were other children in her extended family to take the Fujino line to new highs, finally breaking into the Japanese business world as only a true country-family can. Shizuru, really, was just another girl, in the family, and while her mother and father expect her to someday grown out of the 'faze' of loving me; they've accepted our companionship as what is best for their daughter. For that I am truly grateful. She's finishing up her degree in early childhood education, for the primary school kids now; and I've never seen her happier. It's rather strange to think of her actually liking children that much, as she's got such an unapproachable air about her. _

_She starts her student teaching soon, and I cannot wait to see the grim reality of what awful brats young children really are set in for her. _

_Serves her right, but she's so happy. I most likely won't say anything to her. _

_The fact that Shizuru's about to make the jump into the 'adult' world bothers me. We've been living as students for so long that I'm not sure what a sudden change in our lifestyle will do to out relationship. I'm stuck in school for another two years, doing math until my ears bleed. Shizuru says it builds character. _

_But then again, she also says that her little 'suggestions' about our future together are just that - suggestions. They're not. They're a bad habit. Shizuru's idea of communicating with me is to bounce ideas off me under the guise of jokes and half-truths. _

_Could I ever have a child? Would I ever be able to take someone else into my heart? _

_Would Shizuru even be willing to share that much with a child? She's awfully possessive of me. _

_I do belong to her and only her, after all. _

_Mai says I'm whipped, and most of our friends agree. _

_I guess we will just have to watch and see where this takes us. _

_Sometimes being passive is the best way to find the answer you're looking for._

* * *

_Five Years Later_

Kuga Natsuki hung up her cell phone in disgust and glared moodily out of the window in her corner office. The weather seemed to match her mood, as the once-sunny morning was now overcast and looking quite a bit like rain. Natsuki frowned; she'd have to ride home in the rain, which was never fun.

Money could not buy the power she now held over the company she worked within, the corner office was just a perk of the position. She had no interest in business, but had taken the degree that Fuuka and the remains of First District had dangled tantalizingly in front of her after her high school graduation because she'd nothing better to do. Shizuru had told her that going to university was the best way to drain the resources of First District, as it was so expensive and blackmail was out of the question. Natsuki had known that she had to do something with her life without Shizuru's pointed remarks about how being a motorcycle mechanic specializing in Italian models would not cut it in the Japanese market.

So she'd become a mechanical engineer with a undergraduate degree in business as well. Apparently, she had the 'cutthroat' aptitude that made some succeed in the business world. She'd always enjoyed the physics and mathematics classes she'd actually found her way to in high school, more so after they'd nearly decided to hold her back a year because of poor attendance.

Secretly, Natsuki sometimes gloated that she'd managed to get away with her grand scheme after all. She could work on the inner functions of her precious motorcycles without anyone giving her flack about it. Plenty still tried to, telling her that she was a little girl in a big man's field. No one, however, could deny her skill at what she did. She was one of the best in the field.

Still, some of the more persistent of her rival engineers hounded her, but that had stopped the first time Natsuki's guns had appeared. Two identical semi-automatic pistols purchased as discreetly for protection. Despite what First District and Fuuka promised, Natsuki knew she had many enemies, Shizuru even more.

None of the people killed during the massacre of First District had come back when they'd all been given their fated second chance.

She'd settled on a Walther model after some debate. It was a modern gun, just ten years old when she had started to carry it around - now it was getting on in the years. Well-loved and well-cared for, but thankfully not often used.

No one crossed Kuga, she was the one with the screw loose. Most preferred to keep their limbs attached and simply let the woman they dubbed the 'ice queen' to go about her business in whatever manner she saw fit. She was very good at what she did, after all, and that was all that mattered.

She glanced up at the clock mounted on the wall. It was too early for her call anyone else with Nao's troubling news. This was news for them all, and if Nao could do it, they all would soon be able to. She did not want to be rude, as it was Nao that had been the one delivering the news, Natsuki simply did not trust her. Any claim of the red-head's needed to be confirmed by some other member of their small band of HiME-Sentai.

After all, Nao had not been the first to awaken, the first time around.

Natsuki had no idea who among them had been the first to become completely aware of their powers. Mikoto or Okuzaki-soon-to-be-Tokiha perhaps. Maybe Shizuru.

Certainly not Nao, for any matter.

Frowning, Natsuki tucked her cell phone back in to her pants pocket and turned her attention once again to the paperwork in front of her. Nao could wait; she had waited for most of her life, after all. Natsuki was more than content to have her sit and stew for a few hours until Natsuki's lunch break.

After that, it was anyone's guess, however. Natsuki did not know what to make of Nao's pronouncement. It meant a great many things that she was not sure she wanted to accept at the moment. She had so much else, on her plate right now that more HiME business just seemed like a devil's curse.

_Some devil, indeed. _

She turned her attention back to her drawing board and the small mountain of work she had to get done today.

Several hours later, she was finishing up a rather complicated set of calculations with regards to fuel emissions. Japan had set new standards in recent years that the automotive companies were still struggling to meet in some regards. They weren't in as bad shape as America, who was quickly becoming the reason that the earth was going to hell in a hand basket, but the Japanese people and government had realized that something needed to be done.

So far, it seemed that Natsuki's creation; as of yet unnamed, would be up to the standards of the company and nation.

She grinned. This was a good step, for she'd messed up on the last model she'd had to help design. Human error was to be expected in such a mathematical-based field, but the chewing out she'd received from her boss had not been worth it in Natsuki's mind. She had messed up, and she was the first to admit that. It was her first documented mistake, which made Natsuki feel as though the punishment did not fit the crime. Her boss was another of the men who still refused to accept that Natsuki could do a 'man's' job better than a man could, most of the time.

Sometimes she wondered if she'd gotten into the wrong field. She wasn't unhappy, per say - as she got to work within an industry that she'd been a part of since her fifteenth birthday and her acquisition of a (albeit illegal) motorcycle operator's license. It was better than what some of the others were doing.

Nao was stuck in advertising, selling things to teenagers who were almost as wise as the media when it came to knowing when they were being duped. Natsuki did not envy her for the complicated process of putting out a product into the market once it was created. She stayed well-away from that section of the company. It wasn't worth it for her to get involved, as she still had rather limited people skills when it came to the younger generation.

Her conversations with Nao and Mikoto were hard enough as it was.

Natsuki had long ago come to accept the fact that if anyone could lie to someone's face and convince them to buy something, it was Yuuki Nao. The woman was the most pathological liar that Natsuki knew; this morning's phone call was just the first example that came to mind.

Her phone rang quietly, flashing a familiar number and Natsuki felt her lips pull up into a far brighter expression than she'd been wearing all day. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and flipped it open, "Hey."

"People would think that Natsuki was waiting for me to call," came the softly accented voice on the other end of the line. Natsuki leaned back in her chair and tried to picture what her lover was up to right now. It was lunchtime and a Wednesday, which meant that school was out for the day.

"Perhaps." Natsuki replied. She'd really spent too much time following the woman's speech patterns, as she'd grown into the tendency of being more and more vague as she grew older. She liked to lead her lover on, anyway. "How are the kids?"

"Not that bad today, Takeshi-kun refrained from throwing anything at anyone today." There was a chuckle hidden in her voice and Natsuki found herself grinning again. Two days before, the seven-year-old had thrown a rather large glob of red paint into Shizuru's hair - causing a small incident and a phone call home to his parents. Natsuki did not quite understand what children were coming to these days, if even the bravest of elementary school teachers were at risk of being attacked by their students.

In America they had police guard the schools - as so many children had succumbed to the 'violence in society' and therefore had massacred their classmates with their parents' hunting rifles.

Natsuki thought that ironic, as she had done the exact same thing, but no one tried to change the way the media and education in Japan were run because of it.

Shizuru had always said that the issues caused by the carnival were so deeply seeded that it would take decades to sort them all out. This was just another example of that fact once again. It was almost insane, the oppressive weight of the memories.

Sometimes Natsuki could not stand it.

"That's good to hear," Natsuki said, before her tone grew serious again. There was no point avoiding the subject with Shizuru, as the woman would pick up on the fact that something was bothering Natsuki within the next few sentences of their conversation, "Nao called me today."

Silence.

Never a good sign with Shizuru.

Natsuki hastily added, "She's still at her job, nothing bad has happened! She just... ripped her mattress to shreds in her sleep. With her elements." Natsuki wondered why Nao still brought such a reaction out of Shizuru - for those skeletons had long since been removed from both of their closets. Nao had accepted that Shizuru hated her and Shizuru had gone back to her normal, silent loathing.

Natsuki honestly did not know how to force them to interact with each other. There was a mutual antagonism that existed between the two of them; the same was true for Shizuru's interactions with Kikugawa Yukino. At least Natsuki understood that.

"Perhaps this was just a bad dream of Yuuki's?" Shizuru suggested mildly, her tone suggesting that she did not care at all, really.

"I really hope it was, Shizuru." Natsuki admitted, "But I've never heard her sound so terrified in her life. What if this really happening again?"

_I don't want to lose you again. _

_I don't want to die_.

"It's not, Natsuki. Some of the HiME never lost their ability to summon their elements, look at Mikoto or Okuzaki. Both of them still have their abilities." Shizuru's voice had a placating note that carefully soothed the rising panic in Natsuki's mind.

"I hope so." Natsuki responded. "I tried this morning, and I can't do it." Not quite true, but Natsuki was positive that she would know if she could summon her guns once again.

"I will try after I get home, Natsuki." Shizuru said. "I will call Midori as well; perhaps she knows something about what is going on."

"Perhaps."


	3. Chapter 3

**Passages, Chapter Three**

_AN - I typed this chapter on my new computer, a shiny Compaq Presario named Gakutenou... because I couldn't think of a shiny child from HiME, and Kiyohime just doesn't suit him. I hope this explains the slight delay in getting the chapter up, as I had to write it on three different computers in the process of switching everything over. I'm really impressed by the feedback for this story, and I hope you all enjoy this next installment.  
_

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. Thanks to Glowie for pointing out the error.**  
_

* * *

_When I was younger, I used to be told that I should not have been raised in foster care when my father abandoned me. Because I had a family, I couldn't be accepted into a state-run home. I was given the choice of living in a foster family and I did for a few years. That was before Fuuka called me into their great game. I remember those years, they were relatively happy years for me. I had something that I had not had since my mother's death, a family of sorts. A mother and a sister that loved me very much. _

_Or rather, they loved the compensation of the government sent to them every month. I never realized how little they truly cared for me until I met Shizuru and I realized what a healthy relationship was supposed to look for. The relationships of my childhood were always those of supply and demand. I needed something, so I took it from whatever resources I could – and I provided a nice government check in return every month. _

_What it boiled down to was that I didn't take up much space and I was content with a little affection. Until I discovered my abilities to materialize protons - my HiME powers, I was a fairly easy kid to take care of. I was working my way back up to being a fully functional human being after the time I'd spent in a coma. _

_I was behind in school, and I got teased because of it. No one wanted to have a girl in their class who was older and more mature than them. I started growing into womanhood before many of my classmates and I was a good head taller than most of them until I stopped growing in high school. _

_But as a child, I could not understand why I was so far behind in school. I understood the concepts and the work that they expected me to do with no effort. It was as if they wanted to keep me back just to make sure that I wouldn't break and fall back into a coma once again. _

_Still a year behind in school, huh? _

_What's interesting about being in university is that my classmates range from being a year younger than me (which I've come to accept as normal) to being many years older. I'm not unique anymore, and I like that. Being just another face in the crowd is certainly a breath of fresh air, even if I'm not all that certain that I like the implications of it. It means that I no longer have to feel like the odd man out for not really understanding what my classmates are talking about when they grumble about this, that, or the other thing. _

_What a relief. _

_In one of my structural engineering classes, we have to tour some recently designed and build facilities to examine the modern architecture and complicated structural engineering that has gone into them. Mostly it's just state-run schools and what are essentially orphanages, all the government buildings were built during the economic book in the sixties and no one has looked back as they still function and are relatively earthquake-proof. _

_It's strange to go into a state-run home for children. They're fuller these days than they've been in years. The foster system has really started to deteriorate in recent years and many of the forgotten and abandoned children of _ _Japan__ now live in the prison-like institutes instead of homes and families that welcome them with open arms. It's really rather sad, considering how easy it is to take care of a child. _

_The building design of the state-run children's home reminded me far too much of an overly-modern prison for my liking, but it was the children inside that got me thinking. So many of these kids want nothing more than people who would love them for the rest of their lives - I was once like that. _

_I was once so desperate for contact of any sport, simply needing to feel as though someone loved me. _

_I was angry, so angry all the time at my father, at First District, and eventually at my mother for abandoning me to the HiME's fate. _

_The HiME are damaged goods these days. Mai and Shizuru are the only people I can think of who are actually seem to be genuinely happy with their lives. Mai has her restaurant and Shizuru... well, Shizuru has me. Both of them are doing something they love, though, and I think that being truly happy stems from that. _

_I personally don't much like school; Shizuru says that I'm unhappy because of it. I think I've other issues as well, issues that I've buried so deep within me that I will never be able to come to terms with them. I can't even think of my father without breaking something and now I'm beginning to associate the same anger with my mother. Ten years of careful research and interrogation has revealed a good deal about what she intended to do with me when she discovered I was a HiME. _

_I was supposed to become what Alyssa Searrs was created to be. _

_I was the first prototype. _

_They just never got their hands of me enough to actually test out any of their sick experiments. _

_Thank god. _

_I've never told anyone about my fears and my parental issues, but I've rather adopted Mai as a motherly figure in my life. I've been spending a lot of time with her recently, spelling her with Mikoto as she tries to make end's meat in the restaurant business. She's always tired now, and Mikoto's inability to apply herself to anything even remotely academic is making Mai's attention become even more stretched. _

_I try to help in any way I can, setting up little challenges for Mikoto to complete so that she can finally finish school and get a job. She'll be another one working with children, I can tell just by looking at her. She gets the same gleam in her eye that Shizuru does when I chatter about the education system. _

_Odd to think of that cat-monkey hybrid as an educator. _

_At least the kids will eat well. _

_In a moment of quiet, I asked Mai if she would ever have children. I'd just been to another of those state-run children's homes for with my class and I was feeling as though the question would burst out of me at some odd time if I didn't just come out and ask her. _

_Mai looked at me oddly for a moment and then laughed, "Yuichi and I are far too young for that." She looked away for a minute, before asking me, "What about you and Fujino? Both of you are older than Yuichi and I; and you're both going to have steady jobs pretty soon. It's the perfect environment for children." _

_I don't know what to make of that, Mai says things like that all the time, but for some reason, I wanted to take her seriously. _

_I still worry about Shizuru deciding that she doesn't' want to share me. We could never have a girl. A boy is fine, as the sentiment would never be mistaken for something else. _

_I sometimes wonder about Shizuru. She's so dedicated to me that it's almost impossible for me to question whatever grasp on sanity she's still managed to maintain. I know she struggles with it; I can see it in her eyes sometimes. It bothers me. _

_Why won't she talk to me about it? _

_I watch her move from day to day and I can see her struggle with the convictions of my friends from school and the other HiME. She wants me all to herself, but she knows that it is a selfish wish. _

_Perhaps I should ask her about taking on a foster child. _

_I was one once, and I know that two people like us would have been the one thing I needed more than anything else in the world. Perhaps it would be good for me to try and provide that for another child like myself._

* * *

_Five years later. _

Fujino Shizuru arrived home just ahead of the small mob of school children making their way home from the local primary school. She had made a point of working across town so she would not have to teach the children of her neighbors – for she did not want to deal with the strained relations that educating the young sometimes caused. Still, her eyes raked up and down the group of boys making their way across the street, aided by a harassed-looking older woman that Shizuru knew to be one of the grandmothers involved in the parent's council at the local school. She was looking for a curly head of hair and a brightly colored baseball cap; two familiar characteristics that she'd come to recognize in the almost four years that she'd allowed the little boy into her heart and home.

She stood in the entry way of their apartment building, watching with a closed smile on her face as the group of children made their way towards the building.

"'Kaa-san!" One of the little boys shouted, pushing his way through the crowd to run to meet her. Shizuru held out her arms and caught the boy up in a hug. She understood, on a purely academic level, why the boy needed her to function as a parent. It was a task she been quite suited for to when Natsuki had first suggested they try to take a child out of Japan's foster care system instead of adopting. Natsuki understood the problems that the forgotten children of their country faced, and she wanted to do something even one of them.

Shizuru thought her very noble.

"Did you have a good day at school?" She asked in a mild tone, smiling as sweetly as she could at the woman who'd walked her son home. She'd never liked the way that the woman looked at her and Natsuki, tutting under her breath about the unnaturalness of the two of them.

She was greeted with an equally pleasant and superficial smile; not that she was expecting anything better. There were certain façades that everyone had to put on for the sake of appearances. Shizuru could hate anyone she wanted, but she had to appear to be polite and respectful of her elders and her betters.

People in this town talked, and she did not want to risk doing anything that could tarnish her near-perfect reputation. She could lose her job over something like that, and she didn't think she could handle not being able to see the children she taught everyday.

They'd left Fuuka and the surrounding area, moving as far away as they could. Shizuru had not wanted to run even the risk of meeting the child of one of the people she'd murdered that night at the First District headquarters.

The people who died that night did not come back. There were perhaps hundreds of children that would no longer have a father or a mother because of her one foolish, out of control act.

The idea that the madness was still inside her frightened Shizuru, for she had no way of protecting Natsuki and those she loved from it. Her only hope was to best the madness at its own game and for that, Shizuru taught. There was something incredibly therapeutic about teaching for Shizuru. Despite everything that Natsuki did for Shizuru, there were things that only the children she taught, and now this little boy helped her to truly move through. She was no longer such a loose canon, but she could tell that Natsuki still treaded carefully around her.

She supposed that it was only habit.

"That's wonderful." Shizuru smiled a real smile, the one she usually reserved only for Natsuki, and bent down to look the little boy in the eye. She was greeted with a bright smile and rounded cheeks, a little rosy from the cool autumn air. "Should we go in? I have to make some phone calls, but then you can tell me all about your day."

The little boy's smile turned a little wicked, "Only if you tell me about yours."

Shizuru held out her hand, and the boy took it, "Deal." They shook on it.

Natsuki had started to ask him to shake on things the year before, when he'd started to get into trouble for broken promises and half-truths. The shaking of hands had made the promises all the more real to him, and it had helped him to learn the lesson that they'd been trying to teach him.

Shizuru understood perhaps too well what it meant to tell half-truths. The fact that Yuuki Nao had called Natsuki that morning with the troubling news that she'd managed to summon her element did not shock Shizuru as much as it had clearly shocked Natsuki. After all, it was only a matter of time until those who'd lost their abilities would get them back.

She'd never lost them.

It made her feel dirty, disgusting even, to lie to Natsuki about that small problem that she'd discovered after the carnival; but Shizuru knew she had to.

How exactly does one explain that the ghosts of the past never really go away? Even now Shizuru could feel the madness - the influence of those horrible days - creeping along the outskirts of her consciousness. It had only to find the right trigger and Shizuru knew she would lose herself in it forever.

They climbed the stairs in silence, and Shizuru handed her keys wordlessly to the child, allowing him the honor of unlocking the door. He was one of those boys who would grow up to be the perfect gentleman, should he ever actually bother to learn the manners that she and Natsuki were trying to impress upon him.

Not that Natsuki's own manners were all that impressive. The girl had practically raised herself and Shizuru had spent much of the early years of their friendship making sure that Natsuki would not embarrass Shizuru or herself, should they ever go out together.

"Jun, do you think that you can go and find me the newspaper from this morning?" Shizuru asked. She couldn't have him see what she was about to do. She had to confirm that she could still summon it.

Summon the blade that had murdered hundreds without so much as a second thought.

After the carnival, Shizuru had sent a lot of time trying to pinpoint what had made her snap. What had driven her to murder so many? The question had sprung up in the well of tears after they'd come back to life. When Tokiha Mai had finally done something right.

She had no answer; the only thing that she'd discovered during that period of introspection was that she loved Natsuki far more than she initially believed. It had been in those weeks after the carnival, when they were treading on glass around each other, that Natsuki finally did something that Shizuru could never thank her enough for.

Natsuki forgave her.

As Jun scampered off into the living room to hunt for the newspaper that she knew Natsuki had taken with her to work that morning, Shizuru closed her eyes and concentrated. The blade fell into her hand almost instantly, its weight a comfort that did little to easy the uneasy feeling in her heart.

She should not still be able to do this.

This meant that they were not done with First District or any of the other evils that they'd had to cope with. She frowned. If Nao could do it, it was only a matter of time until others could as well.

She practically yanked the phone out of its cradle in her haste. She would call Tokiha, for she was always the best resource when it came to minor crisises of this sort.

"Hello?" Came a tired-sounding voice on the other end. If Shizuru was to understand Natsuki's conversations with the redhead correctly, Mai slept during the afternoons so that she could run the full nightshift without feeling as though she was going to fall asleep halfway through it.

"Hello Tokiha-san," Shizuru began, "Did I wake you?"

There was some rustling on the other end of the line, and a hissed, "_Mikoto what are you doing!?"_ Before Tokiha's voice came back with a false sound of cheer in it, "Yes yes, everything's fine. I wasn't quite asleep yet."

"Then I'll be brief," Shizuru said, it was only polite after all, to expect someone to be awake at four o'clock in the afternoon.

There was, after all, a reason that Shizuru taught primary school children and not their older counterparts. The job ended with enough time for her to have a nightlife with Natsuki and have time to spend with Jun when he got back from school himself.

He was a bright kid, and everyone liked him.

Perhaps they had done the right thing.

"What's wrong?" Tokiha demanded. Shizuru had to give the girl credit for being able to pick up on the fact that there was something very wrong. The girl was as empathetic as Shizuru was enigmatic. It was a strange combination.

"Natsuki got a phone call this morning, from a rather distraught Yuuki-san." Shizuru said the name with a slight air of contempt that she knew would not go unnoticed. She honestly did not care. Yuuki Nao did not deserve her respect, the loose woman that she was. "Apparently, she's suddenly managed to summon her elements once more."

"You're joking." Tokiha said without so much as a second's pause between Shizuru's completing her sentence.

"I'm not."

"What do we do about it?"

That, it seemed, even Shizuru did not know.


	4. Chapter 4

**Passages, Chapter Four**

_AN - The section where Shizuru says, 'welcome back' and then Natsuki says, 'I'm home' is really just a direct translation from the Japanese of the same phrase. I'm a firm believer in English-speakers not using another language in their writing unless they read and write it fluently enough to understand what exactly it is that they're writing. That's why there are rarely honorifics in my stories. I'm an English speaker writing in English - therefore I do not use a Japanese form of respect and honor  
_

_I'm a Japanese minor in college, by the way, so I would like to think that I know the language well enough to use it in my writing - but I really, really don't  
_

_Atlantislux - People depicting Natsuki as the soldier-type always bothered me, so I did my own thing. I'm glad you liked it.  
NSKruger - don't worry, that gets explained... eventually.  
Hildebrant - The Mai-question gets resolved this chapter, don't worry.  
Azn-anime, Gavril, Glowie, Rainee-chan and shiznats, thank you so much for your words of encouragement. :D_

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. Thanks to Glowie for pointing out the error.**  
_

* * *

_What defines happiness? I'd like to think that I'm happy most of the time. My life is good, I'm going into a field with good job security, I have a woman who loves me more than the world itself by my side. Is that what it really means to be happy? Can someone who has died once already be as happy as a person who has no idea what it is like to fade away into nothingness? Can I even be a whole person having experienced that? _

_Questions like this make me angry, which is why I chose to avoid the philosophy classes that Nao and Mikoto seem to love so much. I never could understand how the two of them got to be such _all knowing_ people – as they're both about the worst candidates I can think of for the position. Perhaps Mai, with her infinite experience and wisdom could pull off being all-knowing, but certainly not Nao. _

_I'm really just impressed that she hasn't gotten kicked out of the university yet for all her delinquent-like habits. Shizuru's all but given up on her, but I find that it's quite soothing to spend an hour or so of my time yelling at Nao for failing a test or not going to class. It's a good way to vent my anger without hurting anyone, as Nao knows I don't really mean it. Shizuru says that if I don't learn to reign in my temper in some other way, however, I'll wind up jobless and alone. _

_I think she was joking, but it's so hard to tell with her. Her face is as impassive as the greatest poker player in the world at times. It's a struggle to even glen a little smidgeon of information out of that poker-face – and I've learned the signs as best I could. _

_Mostly it's in her body language – for her face may be impassive, but the rest of her body is not. She twitches a little when she's excited and fidgets when she's annoyed. It took years of observation to figure out that much, so I doubt that I'll learn any more about Shizuru from watching her. _

_She's gotten better, however. Our first real fight was over the fact that I could never tell what she was thinking. How was I supposed to have a relationship with someone who never expressed emotions? She didn't have an answer for that, just the excuse she's always given me. _

_ Shizuru was brought up to not show emotions at all. It's taken its toll on her over the years, as she keeps them pent up inside her. And it's true. Shizuru is never angry, hurt or upset. I've rarely seen her cry, but when I do, it's usually over something seemingly inconsequential. _

_Like everything else about her fragile psyche, Shizuru has emotional her breaking points. I wonder if her tendency to have an explosion point is a leftover from the carnival ten years ago. It seems likely that everything can stem from that one initial snapping point. _

_That snapping point that was entirely mine in creation. _

_Most of the time, however, Shizuru's a very normal and somewhat boring person to know. She reads romance novels and then dissects their plots with her co-workers and she will sometimes stay up late into the night watching anime like a regular otaku. I don't know why she does that, but she always claims insomnia with a guilty look when I ask. _

_I don't understand her, but I think that's the point of our relationship. _

_We just are. There are no words for what we have. Are is the best word I can think of and it makes this sentence make no sense at all. _

_I cannot think of what it would be like not wake up next to her every morning. It would be devastating to me to lose her; for what we have is so special and unique to only us. _

_We don't always need to speak in words, because, as Mai says, there's always ways that two souls that are as close as Shizuru and mine can communicate without speaking. _

_It sounds like something out of one of Shizuru's romance novels, but it does fit us quite well. _

_I remember back before the carnival, when we were pretending to just be friends - thinking it easier than trying to cross the bridge of just what our relationship was - we would spend hours just talking. _

_It seems, as Shizuru and I know each other for longer, we lose the need to talk to each other at all. _

_I miss those talks. _

_Maybe we're too domestic._

* * *

_Five Years Later. _

Natsuki came home on the earliest train she could catch, which was tricky, as it meant that she had to travel with the evening rush instead of waiting the hour to be able to actually sit down on the train. She was worried about Shizuru, for her reaction to the morning's news had been difficult for even Natsuki to read. Natsuki had already assigned the term 'downright cryptic' to the almost wordless way that Shizuru had managed to take the news without so much as a reaction. When Shizuru had gotten like that the last time, bodies had started to pile up and Natsuki was not willing to partake in such madness again.

She'd rushed through the rest of the day, taking the time at lunch to speak to Shizuru and then to call Nao - to make sure that she was still okay.

Natsuki understood, at least on some level, what Nao was going through. She was dealing with the fact that the people whom she'd come to treat as the most important to her had become different people after the carnival. Her mother was not the same person that Nao remembered and Natsuki knew how people could change after such traumatic times.

Nao was struggling to find her place in the world once again; and Natsuki understood that trial very well. It was strange that it was taking Nao so long to find her niche, but Natsuki knew these things took time. She'd had to do this on her own, for even Shizuru could not help her find all the answers.

It was strange to stumble around blindly in the dark, searching for something that Natsuki did not even have a name for. She wasn't even sure that she'd found it yet, but she was satisfied with the answers she'd gotten when she'd asked her questions.

Nao was the same way, but she was running blind through the corridors of adult life, with no idea what it was sue was supposed to be doing with her life. There was no one to take care of Nao - as there had been for most her life. Her mother had taken one look at had and had told her to get out of the house and never come back.

Natsuki would not have wished the mental anguish that that sentence had caused Nao on anyone.

Shizuru did not approve of the way that Nao spent her days and nights, in the company of many a strange and unknown man and woman. Natsuki understood where Shizuru's disdain came from, but she also saw Nao's struggle with the memories from the past. Memories that Natsuki was partially responsible for creating. It was the fact that Natsuki was filled with guilt for having had a part in creating the state that Nao was in that drove Natsuki to want to help her – even when Shizuru had abandoned the pursuit.

Shizuru was as much stuck in the past as Nao was at times, with both of them carrying around the hurt from before and then after the carnival that it was almost painful to see it sometimes.

Natsuki had taught herself to ignore the hurt in Shizuru. They'd worked through their issues as best they could and now only time could heal the remaining wounds.

Still, Natsuki worried about Shizuru at times.

She arrived at their apartment after a brisk walk from the station. She would have taken her bike to work, but she didn't trust the parking garage they were afforded and the office's location in the middle of the city did not make for any appropriately placed woods for her to hide it. She mostly rode it on the weekends now, taking Jun on joyrides through the countryside.

She really did wish that she could roll up to work one day on her 'bike – just to see the looks on her coworker's faces. They often accused her of not truly understanding what it meant to be a 'passionate motorhead'.

Natsuki thought them all to be fools.

Mostly she was just worried about being accused of brand disloyalty - as she still owned a Ducati model, despite the fact that she now worked for the Suzuki-Yamaha fusion company that had developed in 2010. Natsuki was sure that some of the more foolish men she worked with would make no hesitation in accusing her of being 'unfit' to work for the company since she didn't drive their motorcycles.

Natsuki was rather waiting for one to try. It'd been a while since she'd had a legitimate excuse to lose her temper, and she was looking forward to the opportunity greatly.

"I'm home!" She called, kicking off her uncomfortable work shoes and arranging them as neatly as she could next to Jun and Shizuru's own. A pair of discarded sneakers lay next to Shizuru's house-slippers - most likely Jun had been sent out for the mail when the two of them had returned home.

Shizuru oftentimes needed a moment or two to collect herself before she and Jun settled down for their long afternoons together. She would take him grocery shopping or to the park - but it was Natsuki's job to make sure that he did his homework and studied well.

Shizuru had a grasp on irony that most of the world could not understand.

Yet Natsuki dutifully made sure that Jun, their beloved child, continued to do well in school. So many children in Jun's family situation were doomed to become failures later in life - it was almost as if it was a socioeconomic predisposition, but Natsuki refused to think in the terms of Social Darwinism. If she had risen above it, then anyone could.

Jun came running when Natsuki called, a large grin on his face, "Mai's coming over for a visit!" He shouted excitedly as Natsuki set down her carrying case and pulled off her jacket. Fall was now in full-swing - it would only be a matter of time before the air turned icy and the wind whipped down from the north. Natsuki loved that time of year, for she could get away with wearing pants and long-sleeved shirts at work. It was a nice change from the requirements of 'formal dress' that the warmer seasons demanded.

There was only so much skirt wearing that Natsuki could take before she started to go crazy.

"Really?" She asked, raising her eyebrows at Jun as he grinned triumphantly at her. "How did you manage that?"

"It was his charm, obviously." Shizuru called from the kitchen.

Natsuki grinned and brushed past Jun, intent on seeing Shizuru. They had a lot to talk about, most of which Jun would not understand. Natsuki still felt it was bad for her to talk about anything HiME-related around him, for it was next to impossible to tell who he'd mention it to.

Children's mouths are like sieves - it's next to impossible to keep anything from flowing out of them.

Shizuru was sitting at the kitchen table, a timer set out in front of her and a pile of writing assignments spread out around it. "Welcome home."

Natsuki smiled fondly at her, "I'm back." She pulled a chair out from the table and pulled one of the papers Shizuru was marking towards her, "You've moved on to the third grade kanji already?" She asked, raising an eyebrow at the woman across from her.

"I'm merely curious as to the reason they assign grades to the kanji. The class seems intelligent enough to understand these, so why not teach them?" Shizuru said, raising an eyebrow over her reading glasses.

"I see," Natsuki said, "It will be a grand experiment then."

"Exactly." Shizuru said with a perfectly serious face. There was a rather comical glint in her eye, but her face was the picture of stock-seriousness that Natsuki had come to expect of 'teacher-Shizuru,' the beloved instructor who guided the second-year primary school students through their lessons.

Natsuki couldn't help it, with all the panicked thoughts that were running through her head, Shizuru's proclamation was even more absurd than Natsuki supposed she had intended it to be; she started to giggle.

Shizuru smiled politely, indulging Natsuki's rather rude outburst. Had Natsuki been anyone else, she would have gotten a very eloquent, but direct, verbal dressing down. "I spoke to Tokiha today; she's agreed to come over during her break tonight."

Natsuki sighed, regaining her composure as the conversation had turned to a serious topic. "You know that you've known her for long enough that you could easily get away with calling her Mai, don't you?"

"It's always better to be polite, right Jun?" Shizuru said, ever so subtly alerting Natsuki to the little boy's presence in the room. Natsuki thanked her with a small smile and turned around, "What are you doing, lurking in doorways?" She demanded with a mock-serious tone in her voice.

"Waiting until you two were not talking about adult things." Jun explained, looking hesitant.

"We weren't talking about anything adult, just Natsuki's rude nature and poor upbringing." Shizuru explained simply, pushing her chair back as the timer beeped shrilly.

"S-Shizuru!" Natsuki spluttered, for the woman's teasing, even after all their years together, was enough to make Natsuki lose whatever train of thought she had.

It was really a problem.

"'Kaa-chan made Natsuki blush!" Jun giggled, settling himself down in a chair next to Natsuki.

"'Kaa-chan' does that a lot," Natsuki grumbled. She looked up to see Shizuru smiling at her with a genuinely amused smile.

She frowned.

Shizuru's smile got wider.

"Dammit, don't grin like that!" Natsuki growled, glaring at Shizuru.

Jun giggled.

Turning the oven down, Shizuru tutted at Jun, "It's not nice to laugh at people."

Natsuki rolled her eyes; there was no real arguing with her at times. Shizuru was a force of nature at times and to fight against the natural order of things was not something that Natsuki had ever done willingly. And besides, Shizuru was allowed to be hypocritical from time to time, goodness knew Natsuki was. Turning to Jun, she asked, "Don't you have homework to do?"

Jun blinked, looking as though he'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar again. Shizuru must have let him play on the Playstation again instead of getting him started on his work. He shook his curly haired-head and looked sheepishly at Natsuki, "Yes, math and some history reading."

"You should do it before Mai comes over, so you can spend time with her." Natsuki pointed out, knowing that such a thought would not have occurred to Jun's young mind.

"Okay!" Bouncing off of his chair, Jun raced out of the kitchen, presumably to his bedroom. He'd be occupied for a while - at least until dinner was ready.

Natsuki stood up and moved to stand next to Shizuru, "Mai's coming over to talk, isn't she?"

"She did not believe me when I told her; I thought that perhaps hearing it from Natsuki would it sink in better." Shizuru reasoned, drying her hands on the towel hanging from their empty paper-towel rack. Shizuru was trying a more environmentally friendly living model after the latest study in global warming had fingered Japan as among one of the leading contributors to the shrinking of the polar icecaps.

"You could have just told her to call Nao, you know." Natsuki muttered.

"But then Jun would not get to see her, and he does love her like a sister." Shizuru explained. She turned to face Natsuki, her body suddenly far closer than Natsuki remembered it being. "I missed you," She confessed, leaning in and placing a hand on Natsuki's cheek.

Natsuki leaned into the touch. It was as if Shizuru was somehow managing to siphon off all of her worries and insecurities thought that gentle caress. She couldn't do anything but let the feeling of contentment wash over her.

"I cannot even begin to think about how Nao managed to do that, in her sleep no less." Natsuki confessed. "It's just so farfetched sounding."

"Mmm." Shizuru affirmed, her hand traveling down to warp around Natsuki's neck. "Perhaps Yuuki imagined the whole thing. It's quite like her to want your attention."

Natsuki shook her head, "I don't think so."

Shizuru shrugged, and leaned in to kiss Natsuki. It was an innocent kiss, the sort that they often exchanged around Jun and their close friends - the sort that would not get them into trouble for 'indecency'.

It was an innocent kiss, and innocence was something that neither woman had much of anymore.


	5. Chapter 5

**Passages, Chapter Five**

_AN - I don't like writing Mai. I just thought that I should get that out there before this goes too far. She's too different from me (but such a Hufflepuff, oh my god) for me to actually write her well. I do better with stubborn, angry Hufflepuffs like Natsuki and awesome Slytherins like Shizuru - I guess it's just a post-Potter sort of thing. But Natsuki is soooo a Hufflepuff.  
_

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. **  
_

* * *

_Mai? Mai's alright._

* * *

_Five Years Later. _

Tate (formerly Tokiha) Mai cast one last glance in the direction of the restaurant before heading off into the growing evening. It hurt her to leave her precious hub of activity, but she knew it to be in good hands. The staff would be alright without their hostess and head chef for the evening - and Tate was taking care of Arisa until she got back. Really, the only person that Mai had had to factor into her plans was Mikoto, but a call from Reito earlier that day had made it so that the girl did not have to come to this meeting at Natsuki's. Instead, Mikoto was going to spend the weekend with her beloved brother while Mai enjoyed the first weekend of alone-time she'd had with Yuichi in what seemed like forever.

Technically, it wasn't forever, just a month or two. But Mai loved to exaggerate her lack of free time, it made her feel human.

She had to admit that she was not really sure how to react to Fujino Shizuru's pronouncement that the elements were back. That would mean that the carnival would come back in full. It had to mean that they'd all have to fight; all of them would have to displace the happiness that they'd finally managed to find.

She was worried, desperately worried.

Her pace hastened as she made her way towards the bus stop. Natsuki lived far enough away that walking would make her late for their eight o'clock meeting time and the wind was picking up. She didn't want to be caught in what could become a bitterly cold and rainy night. It was only early autumn, but the weather had been getting colder in recent years, even by Japanese standards.

The bus arrived without incident and Mai found herself lost in thought once more.

The elements.

The thought made her shudder - she'd put that behind her as best she could, keeping up ties with the other HiME, but not letting the past connection rule her life. She had a good existence now; she didn't want to risk ruining it on something that Yuuki Nao of all people had brought up in the first place.

Some things just weren't worth it.

Still, since Fujino Shizuru herself had called her out, Mai felt compelled to go and see what Natsuki thought about the situation. Seeing Fujino (not that she really wanted to) and Jun just been added bonuses.

Mai had never really been sure how to act around the former student-council president - even though she was now supposed to be one of the most approachable people in the workforce today. Educator or not, Fujino Shizuru was still a largely unknown quality in Mai's friendship with the other HiME. The woman was powerful in her own right, perhaps even more powerful than Mai had been during the carnival; but it was the barely veiled grasp on what could be called sanity that oftentimes bothered Mai greatly. It made Fujino into even more of an enigma. Mai did not like enigmas. They were constant thorns in her side at work and in her daily life.

"Atch..." She muttered as the bus moved around another bend in the road and she pressed the 'stop requested' bar that ran along the side of the bus.

As the bus rolled to a stop just a little past where she would have liked to get off, Mai realized that she really was not ready to face whatever was about to happen.

She was finally starting to be happy again.

Midori had once theorized in her research about the HiME that the HiME's abilities stemmed largely from their happiness with their most important person - and Mai reasoned that it would make sense for that person, the key to the HiME's power, to grow and change over time. She had not spent as much thought on the matter, but it was what made the most logical sense to her.

Had her most important person changed?

It certainly wasn't Takumi any more, that was for certain - and whatever connection she'd had with Mikoto had worn down over years of taking care of the woman who should have had the skills to take care of herself.

Yuuichi?

Perhaps, but it was a prospect that Mai found terrifying in itself.

She did not want to risk losing him again.

Mai's pace was quick as she walked the remaining three blocks to Natsuki's apartment. She didn't know what to expect, but a part of her was terrified that the news was actually far worse that Fujino had hinted on the phone. Natsuki was known to not tell her lover everything, especially when it came to issues of Yuuki Nao.

_Gods above_, Mai prayed, _I hope it's not that._

She knocked once on the door, knowing from the lights and voices just beyond the door that the occupants were indeed home. A few moments later, Natsuki pulled open the door and greeted Mai with a rather harassed look that could be considered a smile, if you knew what you were looking for.

"Hey." She said in way of greeting, pulling the door open further and letting Mai pass through.

Mai smiled a little, "Hey yourself. How are you all doing?"

"As well as can be expected." Natsuki muttered under her breath before straightening up and giving Mai a half-grin that bore a closer resemblance to a grimace. "We've just eaten, but there are some leftovers if you're hungry."

"I'm fine," Mai said, taking off her shoes and stepping up and into the apartment proper. She didn't know how to start her line of questioning, but before she could say anything, Natsuki asked;

"How are Arisa and Tate?"

Mai looked up sharply, for it was unlike Natsuki to question after the welfare of her family, for she was too wrapped up in her own. Arisa was a recent addition to their HiME-based extended family, perhaps the most recent, but Mai wasn't in contact with many of the other HiME.

Just Natsuki, who'd acted as the witness for her rather hasty marriage to Yuichi almost a year before.

She hadn't expected to be pregnant when she'd taken that pregnancy test, that was for certain.

"They're good. Arisa has some teeth now, and she's finally sleeping." Mai said with a bright smile. The little girl was a handful, certainly not the angel that her namesake had been. Yuichi, Natsuki and the many of Mai's other friends could not understand her insistence that the little girl be named after the fallen thirteenth HiME.

It was just something Mai had had to do at the time, and the girl would grow up to be every bit the angel that Alyssa Searrs had been. Mai was sure of that.

Natsuki sighed, "I can barely balance work and Jun, how do you manage running a restaurant as well?"

Mai tried her best to look mysterious, "That's a trade secret, if I told you, and your life could be in danger."

Not the best thing to say, as Natsuki's eyes narrowed and her hands twitched instinctively in the motion that would have called out her elements, if she'd still had the abilities to summon them. She was far more on edge that Mai had initially thought. That could prove to be a problem in the long run – especially if this turned out to be a 'something' rather than just another one of Nao's mind games.

"That was a poor joke." Fujino Shizuru called from the doorway to the kitchen. A distant and empty smile played on her lips as she stared hard at the pair of them in the entryway. Mai felt the blood drain from her face as she stared hard into those red eyes that had once been so dead that it was as if there was no soul hidden behind them.

They stood in silence for a few long moments, as Mai tried to find the words that had suddenly escaped her. She knew that she should not fear Fujino, as she had not been the sort to murder in cold blood since Natsuki had finally gotten her head out of her ass and admitted how much she loved her best friend.

Still, there was something terrifying about the woman, not matter how much interaction Mai had with her. They'd been 'friends' for years now, but still Mai couldn't bring herself to call her by her first name. That was an intimacy allowed only to Natsuki and possibly Fujino's parents.

Natsuki coughed delicately and grabbed Mai's arm. "Come into the kitchen, you can at least have tea, right?"

Mai supposed that she should, "Thanks." She glanced around, and added to Natsuki as they headed into the kitchen, "Where's Jun?"

Fujino answered, giggling slightly, "He fell asleep while doing his school work, and I didn't have the heart to wake him up." She shrugged, "He was mostly finished anyway."

Mai did rather understand where Suzushiro's disdain for the woman came from. She was so passive about most things that it was easy to overlook her more fierce nature.

Still, it still mystified Mai as to how a woman like her, so arguably a space case, could have become an educator in the demanding Japanese education system. She grinned, "I'll bet he was very cute, sleeping all over his books like that."

Fujino nodded, "Yes, he reminded me of Natsuki, actually, drooling on his math homework."

Natsuki looked indignant, "I do not drool." Despite her annoyed tone, Mai could hear the affection and familiarity in her voice that Natsuki rarely used on anyone else. It was a strange sort of closeness that Natsuki had with her lover that Mai never had had with Tate.

Or anyone for that matter.

Perhaps that closeness came from dying together.

"Whatever you say," Fujino nodded at Mai, a twinkle in her eye that made Mai have to smile even though she knew that Natsuki would be cross with her for taking Fujino's side.

She did drool, after all.

"So tell me, Natsuki, why the big panic?" Mai began. This news had come from the most unlikely of sources, after all. She had a right to question it, as she suspected, Fujino did.

"I don't think that I've ever heard Nao so frightened." Natsuki began, glancing at Fujino's back before she began. "I've heard Nao plenty terrified before, but this was different."

"Any idea why?" Mai asked, for she had also heard Nao terrified. The carnival had taken away far more from her than from most of them, as it had completely destroyed whatever relationship she had had with the people most important to her. She was left alone, completely alone, save for the HiME.

And all of them had their own baggage to deal with, so it wasn't as if they were much help.

Mai had tried to help her out in the beginning, but the most central person in Nao's life very quickly became Kuga Natsuki.

She wasn't even sure why she found that thought so disturbing. It was as though three of the HiME were now connected in an irreversible way. Not to mention the fact that Fujino Shizuru's memory was longer than an elephant when it came to past wrongs. She would most likely hold Nao responsible for her actions during the carnival until the day she died. Mai didn't like to judge people like that, and she'd forgiven Nao's trespasses against her far more easily than Fujino, or Natsuki even, had forgiven Nao.

"No." Natsuki moved towards the kitchen cupboards and pulled out three mugs, one in the traditional Japanese style, and two more western-style mugs.

It seemed that Fujino had never quite been able to rid Natsuki of her coffee drinking habit.

"If she's summoning her elements again, that means that Midori was right, however." Mai said, "A HiME's power stems from that of their most important person - so if Nao's finally found someone she can be truly happy with, doesn't that mean that it's natural for her powers to come back?"

"I don't think so." Natsuki said, "The carnival ended, and both First District and Searrs promised us that nothing more would happen." She looked uncomfortable for a minute, "As much as I don't want to trust them, I think they were being sincere."

Mai nodded. She had also thought that both organizations were far too afraid of what might happen if they cross the HiME once again to try anything.

But it had been fifteen years since that conversation.

Her bag began to emit a shrill beeping, her cell phone was ringing.

"Excuse me," She said with an apologetic smile. It was most likely Yuichi wondering how to heat up the food she'd left for him and Arisa before she'd left. Yuichi was nothing if nor predictable. "Hello, this is Mai."

"Ah, Mai-chan!" Mai nearly dropped the phone.

"Midori?!" She asked a shocked expression on her face. Natsuki and Fujino gaped at her openly. Midori had been off in America for the past year, collecting information for yet another PhD dissertation - and her phone calls were few and far between.

"Yes, it's me. I was thinking that you'd be wanting to hear from me soon. You and Kuga both."


	6. Chapter 6

**Passages, Chapter Six**

_AN - Okay, plot. And some other, not so relevant information. It's cold here. I don't like being cold. Those of you who want to see Killpoint updated, please wait nicely. It's coming, but slowly. I like this story more.  
_

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. **  
_

* * *

_Midori left her teaching position shortly after Nao and the others graduated. She had no reason to be there anymore - and Fuuka was not paying her as much as she could earn in other places. Last I heard, she'd accepted a fellowship in _ _America__, pursuing a PhD in the study some sort of ancient civilization. I don't understand her love for people and cultures so long dead that they are now the stuff of legend. To me it seems completely pointless to learn about something like that, because the world has proven time and time again that history simply repeats itself. _

_There's no way that Midori's quest to learn more about how the HiME worked would help her in the long run. I'd said that from the beginning, but her knowledge did prove to be somewhat useful once upon a time. Midori's interests in the HiME have always been purely academic, but I find her interest a little scary at times. Why would anyone want to know more about the horrible game that Fuuka forced us to play? It just doesn't make sense to obsess about something that came painfully close to destroying our lives completely. _

_I asked her about that before she left and she told me that it really was 'to each his own,' and she'd never stop looking for the true answers behind the legends of Ikusahime. It's almost as much of an obsession for her as revenge on First District was for a good portion of my life. _

_HiME obsess about things, Midori has informed us. They are the brooding type, even those of them who don't seem to have any problems at all brood over most everything. _

_It's scary to think we can all be lumped together like that, really. _

_I still see her when she comes back to _ _Japan__, but those visits are starting to get further and farther between. I no longer know when I can predict her visits. _

_Shizuru says that she's finally grown up as though it's a good thing - but I miss her as one of the oldest HiME. It's nice to have a big-sister figure to look up to, really. _

_Maybe I'm just projecting the family I've always wanted onto the other HiME. That'd be like Mai than myself, wishing for nothing more than happiness and another chance at a perfect life. I've never had a perfect life, and I don't think I ever will. My existence now depends so much on Shizuru that I feel bad for her at times - knowing that she is the only one standing between me and a very unhappy life. _

_She's always stood in the way of that, and I sometimes allow myself to forget it. I love her so much that I let myself have the temporary moment of foolishness that it takes to forget just how important she is to me. _

_I wonder if Midori will ever have that happiness, as she's always told me that her professor doesn't feel the same way. Perhaps the most important person to her will change after all this time spent apart from him. I really hope that she will find happiness eventually, and I don't think she's found it now. _

_Midori's always been a wild card because I cannot predict her movements. I think that's the reason Shizuru likes her so much, because Shizuru has found a way to predict the unpredictability. _

_I don't understand it. _

_She's still researching the HiME though, and I'm not sure if she'll find anything more. She's so convinced that she's finally got the legend figured out to the point where she can guarantee that we're not going to have to fight again in our lifetimes. _

_But she's been wrong before. More wrong than right, as it happens. I want to say that she's correct in her thinking, and that we can believe First District when they say that the game is over, but this feels like something else. _

_Like the calm before a storm. _

_There's something evil lurking out there and I don't know how to protect against it other than by throwing a blind trust behind Midori and her assertion that we are finally going to be allowed peace. _

_Shizuru can sense it too, she spends long hours just staring out the window, her hand flexing instinctively for her weapon. It's a little scary to catch her at it, for I remember every time that blade swiped a little too close to my body, too close for comfort or anything else. She was beautiful and deadly with that blade, and I think even now she misses it and the power it provides her. _

_I've never asked her if she trained with it before she discovered that she was a HiME - but all evidence speaks to the fact that she did. I wonder what it would take to learn a weapon like that, guns are so much easier to use._

* * *

_Five years later. _

The room was silent as Mai spoke, for everyone could hear the conversation on the other end anyway. Natsuki thought that Mai must be somewhat deaf for needing to have the volume in her cell phone turned up so high - but she was used to using it in a loud kitchen, so there might have been a reason behind it. Midori knew something, the thought ran through Natsuki's brain like a mantra, _She knows what's going on_. _Midori's finally going to come through with something real._.

"Midori, can you call back on Natsuki's home phone?" Mai asked, and Natsuki shot her a quick look. How on earth would they be able to talk on that phone, when they only had one phone attached to it? It didn't make sense.

Midori said something garbled and Mai smiled politely into the phone receiver. Natsuki shook her head; Mai was always so polite that it was almost ridiculous how she would forget herself with the strangest of things.

There was no need to smile at a telephone.

"Mmm, yes, Natsuki has a speaker-phone attachment, so we can all hear you and participate in the conversation." Mai responded and then closed the phone. She looked sheepishly at Natsuki and then said, "She's going to call back on your land line."

"We have speaker phone?" Natsuki demanded, "How the hell do you know?" She cast an accusatory glare in Shizuru's direction. Something more was going on here, and Shizuru was in on it, that much was certain.

Shizuru giggled, "Natsuki," she said evenly, "Most phones come with speaker attachments these days."

Natsuki had not been aware of that. She had thought that phones like that were generally reserved for the corporate offices she had to work in on a daily basis. She still wanted to know what was going on with whatever news Midori had, but now Mai had hung up on her. She didn't like it when people made decisions involving her without her consent. She was an adult down, and had been for quite some time.

What on earth could this mean? Midori knew something about the HiME, something more than before; and this call was so perfectly timed to be about anything but HiME business.

"What does all this mean?" Natsuki wondered out loud, her now lukewarm tea and downing it in one gulp.

Nao. All this stemmed from Nao.

Natsuki felt a rather irrational surge of anger coming from deep within her. She liked Nao fine enough, and once the girl had stopped being a delinquent-turned-psychopath, Natsuki actually enjoyed her company - but the anger and resentment were there all the same.

If Nao had not discovered this sudden return of her powers, would she be sitting between a fidgety Mai and an unnaturally accepting and calm Shizuru? Natsuki didn't think that the situation could get any worse.

The phone rang and Shizuru pressed a button on the receiver before answering it. "Hello, this is Fujino." Natsuki always wondered where her professionalism came from on the telephone, because it was only with caller-id that Shizuru would actually answer the phone as a normal person.

"Ah, Shizuru, good to talk to you as well. Mai didn't mention you were there." Midori's voice filled the calm silence that had filled the room since Natsuki's out-loud musing. Natsuki sighed, she got enough conference-calls at work to last her a life time, and she did not need them here as well.

Mai looked sheepishly at Shizuru, "I'm sorry, Midori, I thought you would assume that we were all together."

Midori muttered something in English that Natsuki did not understand, but then asked, "Anyone else there I should know about?"

"Not unless Jun wakes up." Natsuki responded. Midori knew about Jun, but as she'd never met the boy there was little behavior association that Midori could glean from an off-hand comment like that. Natsuki intended to keep it that way. Midori didn't exactly approve of the HiME having children. Five years ago, when Midori first left for America, she'd said then than it was not a good idea for the HiME to settle down just yet, as there was a good chance that their battles were not over yet.

Despite her insistence to the contrary just months earlier.

Natsuki had thought her insane at the time, but now she didn't know what to think. Could their children really be in danger if they had to fight again? It made sense that they would be at risk if Searrs was involved, as that organization was more than willing to kidnap children and force them to be the subjects of their experiments. Natsuki cast a nervous glance towards the room where Jun was sleeping.

She'd protect him with her life if she had to.

"Good, good, as I don't want to cause a panic." There was some commotion on the other end of the line and more conversation in English.

Natsuki couldn't help but think that Midori was being exceptionally rude. Spending time in America must have made her forget what a prudent Japanese person would do in a situation like that. She hadn't even excused herself as she shouted at whoever was in the room with her.

"Is there any reason for there to be a panic?" Shizuru asked mildly, sipping her tea. She looked perfectly at ease with the fact that Midori was carrying on in English while having a conversation with them.

_Most likely because she and Mai can both understand it, for the most part_, Natsuki frowned, wishing that she'd actually taken the time to master than language instead of the far more necessary Chinese at university.

It'd been a toss-up at the time, half the world's population spoke Chinese and the other half spoke English as well as whatever other language they spoke in their home country.

Perhaps her business-program had just assumed that she'd already known the language as she'd tested out of that class in high school.

"_No_," Midori began in English, before switching back to Japanese, "I mean, no, there's no reason to panic. Right now I'm studying a series of stories I found referenced across several different Amerindian language groups. That's how you tell their heritage apart, according to the American experts in the field. Basically, there's a cross-cultural story about twelve warriors, each represented by a different avatar - the wolf, the fire-bird, and so-on. They fight a great series of battles amongst themselves and then unite against a greater foe. I caught on to the story because it sounded so much like the Ikusahime myths and now I'm convinced that it is the same storyline."

Midori paused to catch her breath and Natsuki exchanged a long look with Shizuru. This would mean only one thing for them, if their story was that universal. They were bound to be dragged into another battle, and neither of them was ready to put that much on the line once more.

They'd already done it once and that was more than enough for the both of them.

Mai exhaled quietly next to Natsuki and sipped her tea, her expression blank. Natsuki wondered when Mai had acquired the skill to do that, as she had once had one of the most expressive faces Natsuki could think of. It was strange to watch.

"Or rather," Midori continued, "it's the same story line with one main exception. It does not end when the 'great stone darkness' is defeated. It goes on to tell what happened afterwards to the souls caught up in the battle."

"The same storyline?" Mai asked, "Midori, are we really that universal?"

"The story differs in only a few situational details." Midori answered, sounding a little smug. Natsuki could just envision her surrounded by a messy and knowledge-filled office, tapping away at her computer while she spoke to them. How much work must it have taken to compile that much information? If Natsuki remembered correctly, no one had ever bothered to write down the Amerindian folklore. That meant that Midori must have been talking to people about their stories for months, if not years to get this far in her thesis.

"So tell me then, Midori, what is going to happen to us now?" Shizuru asked with a rather bemused chuckle. Natsuki could tell that she wasn't taking this as seriously as she needed to as a protection against the crashing reality of what Midori was saying. It was a good defense, Natsuki admitted, but she did not want to think of the consequences of what would happen if Shizuru simply refused to accept whatever reality was coming for them.

"They were happy, for a spell. Then things started to change. The relationships formed during the battle started to fall apart, and new ones formed. Great and epic stories in their own right, these relationships; but that's completely beside the point.

"What happened is that they were happy and then they had to fight against something else. I can't translate the name, but it means 'greater darkness' in our language. It was apparently a more formidable foe than the Obsidian Lord ever was. No one died in that battle, however, as the warriors - the HiME - were united against their foe."

"I can't believe this." Natsuki muttered, banging her clenched fist down on the table. She added in a far louder and angrier voice than she had been anticipating, "After all we've worked for, it's just going to go to fucking hell again."

Mai too looked as though she wanted to burst out with something, but she held her tongue. Natsuki was rather impressed that Mai did not say what she felt. When had her emotions shut down so completely that she was unable to wear her heart on her sleeve the way she always had?

It didn't make any sense.

Shizuru cast a sympathetic look in Natsuki direction, and rested her hand on top of her clenched fist. Natsuki gulped in breath of air, and then let it out slowly. She did need to calm down, Shizuru was right. This was no time to lose her head.

It amazed Natsuki how they were able to communicate without words at times.

"I'm going to be on a plane home in a few days, you should get in touch with everyone you can. The HiME-Sentai are gathering once more!" Midori laughed and then the sound of static filled the room, followed by the dial tone.

She'd hung up on them.

They sat in silence for a few long, pregnant moments, not looking at each other. Natsuki felt awkward, sitting between the two HiME that she'd written off as being the most powerful. Shizuru and Mai had always been the powerhouses of the HiME, while Natsuki existed for short distance and close battles.

Sometimes she wished that she'd had been stronger, but in the end she'd decided that she was plenty strong enough for what she'd had to do.

Mai set her mug down and smiled sadly at Natsuki and Shizuru. Bowing her head respectfully, she turned to leave. "I - I have to go." She muttered, as if in a panicked trance.

Natsuki stood up as well and grabbed Mai's hand, "Don't leave."

Shizuru had hung up the phone, and the apartment was filled with a deafening silence.

"I can't do it again, Natsuki." Mai said, "I can't."

"No one's asking you to, we're all in this together." Natsuki shot back almost without thinking. She wasn't the first person to be the poster-child for teamwork, but if they had a chance to beat this thing, it would be together, not separated the way they'd - Mai'd - taken down the Obsidian Lord.


	7. Chapter 7

**Passages, Chapter Seven**

_AN - I'm looking for some feedback on this story, as I know where I'm going; but I'm not sure how to quite express it in words. Everything is coming together nicely, but this chapter ends the first day of the story - Midori's right, really, but I think that she doesn't realize how fast these thing are supposed to be happening, as she thinks she has time to wrap up her affairs at home before coming back to Japan. Foolish, really.  
_

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. **  
_

* * *

_Why is it that every time I find myself facing down the unholy terror that is Suzushiro Haruka, I find myself turning to sarcasm and spite more often than not to combat her general idiocy? I'm not an intentionally cruel person, but that crazy woman seems to bright out the best of that in me, causing my mouth to form far harsher words that I would like to. _

_It's not my place to judge people, for I have not been anyone's judge since I acted as Shizuru's final judgment. I never want to repeat the experience, but I know, deep within me, that it's only a matter of time before I must do it again. _

_I'm sure she's a smart person, but she's so brash that her gung-ho way of doing things really starts to grate on my nerves. I cannot stand for the way that she will rush blindly from one place to the next, jabbering about this and that, without stopping to think of the consequences. _

_People get killed because of actions like that. I think she knows it too, but is too foolish to identify the trait in herself. _

_Someday, I know, she'll let the story of the HiME slip and then god knows where we'll be. Most likely in some government testing facility far away from the prying eyes of society, I know for a fact that they'd take Shizuru away from me then. _

_I don't think I can ever trust her, not really. Suzushiro Haruka is far too much of a wild card for her to ever earn my trust completely. _

_Unfortunately, however, she is included in our little HiME-group by proxy, because of her friendship with Kikugawa Yukino. _

_I actually rather like Yukino. She's steady and has a good head about her when it comes to matters of the heart and the mind - I just wish that she'd pick her friends better, as half the time I spend with her, I wind up having to defend Shizuru's honor from that crazy woman. _

_It's not fun. _

_Still, Yukino has made an effort, despite her reluctance to be a HiME in the first place, to stay in contact with the rest of us. I think that she considers us her last link to that time, and she's not sure if she wants to escape it or not. She's different from us, though, because of her initial reluctance to fight. She went down pretty early, in the scheme of things – and she's not broken the way Nao is because of it. _

_She's one of the few reluctantly powerful players I can think of today, for her power lies not in her action, but rather in her inability to decide upon how to proceed with her action. For me, that's a powerful weapon, as no one can predict her movements and circumvent them. _

_Yukino went into politics, which was really a surprise for no one; and she's currently working under one of the local politicians as a strategist. They grabbed her right out of school, her grades and reputation had been that good. _

_I'm glad for her, but she's sold her soul to the devil, working for those types of people. There's a reason why not much happens in the legal system of _ _Japan__, and I think it lies in the hands of those politicians that Yukino's working for now. Personally, I don't know how she stands it, working for someone who lies to everyone. _

_Everyone knows you can't trust a politician. They're something like the scum of the earth. They lie with greater ease that Shizuru drinks tea, and have no qualms about it. _

_But Yukino cannot lie as well as she can stay neutral. She's moved on from the mess that was the HiME, but she still has trouble around Shizuru, even I can sense it, and I've been called dense from time to time. _

_Who wouldn't, after what Shizuru did? _

_I sometimes wonder why I'm so at ease around her, and I usually conclude that it's because I know her better than anyone else. I have that power over her, and she respects it. I know she loves me more than life itself, and that's a really reassuring thought most of the time. _

_I wish I could see her more, but her schedule and Suzushiro make it difficult for me to have a conversation with someone I'd call a friend, instead of an argument. _

_It seems I really never can win._

* * *

_Five years later. _

_From the private writings of Kuga Natsuki: _

_There are times when I just want to say 'let's be done with it' and move on with my life. I have them far more often than not these days, but never so much as I felt tonight. I don't know if I buy Midori's proclamation that there was a carnival in __North America__ of all places, even though it fits in with the general patter of HiME activity. _

_Unpredictable and chaotic. _

_Perhaps even predictable in it's unpredictability. _

_Why is it that whenever we finally are given a chance to be happy, that this curse of power rips it away from us once more? _

_I just want a peaceful existence; the violence of my youth has gone now. _

_Is it to much to ask to be happy? _

It was late into the evening when Mai finally departed, Natsuki had offered to drive her home, but she'd begged off, citing that she needed the travel time to think. Natsuki honestly didn't blame Mai that much for her actions, considering she was feeling the same acute sense of panic that she'd seen written quite plainly behind Mai's eyes.

What if Midori really was correct in her theory about the HiME?

What if there really was something more evil and all-consuming than fighting amongst each other, trying to save those most precious to you?

The idea of having to fight something more evil than the darkness within their own hearts simply did not settle well with Natsuki, and she desperately wanted to pretend that it wasn't going to happen.

That was what Shizuru was doing, Natsuki guessed. Keeping her calm and her cool until they knew something definitive; Natsuki was far more inclined to simply panic first and ask questions later. _Besides_, she thought jadedly, _this fits in perfectly to the story of my life. One bad thing after another. Can I never be truly happy? _

_Not if those bastards have anything to do with it. _

She was sitting at her desk, going through the papers that she needed for the following day at work, when Shizuru came up behind her, embracing her from behind. Natsuki was used to this by now, for she'd trained herself to not even react. She loved Shizuru very dearly, and was content to accept her lover's want to be close to her. "Natsuki shouldn't work so hard." Shizuru muttered, pressing herself more firmly against Natsuki's back.

Natsuki inhaled sharply, for the feeling of _all_ of Shizuru pressed very nicely against her was quite enticing, but remained silent. She concentrated as much of her attention as she could on moving her papers into two neat piles before she trusted her voice to speak once again. "I don't work hard; I just need to do this."

It was true, to some extent; Natsuki had grown into being an almost obsessively organized person about her work. She had to, because it was either that or fall behind in her classes. So many of her professors in college never actually bothered to talk about the assignments before they were due, and then at work, her deadlines always snuck up on her in that ridiculous way that they usually did.

She rather resented it.

She pushed her papers into their two piles as quickly as she could, for she could feel Shizuru's questioning eyes on her more personal musings on paper. Usually, when Natsuki bothered to write down her feelings, it was to help her figure out how to best say them to Shizuru later on.

She still didn't know how to ask Shizuru if she was really there, or if they'd once again be fighting against the demon she'd become during the carnival. Shizuru had been far too calm, accepting the news of Midori's theory, and Natsuki had learned long again that a calm Shizuru was unpredictable at best.

Natsuki exhaled and leaned back into Shizuru's embrace. "We were doing so well, Why does this always happen to us when we're finally happy?"

"I'd wonder if this is the curse of being a HiME." Shizuru muttered her lips on Natsuki's ear and her breath hot.

Natsuki inhaled sharply once again.

She was content with the closeness that they shared as both lovers and partners. They were a powerful force together, and Natsuki found that nearly everything Shizuru did these days made her love the woman more. The complimented each other quite nicely, but Shizuru could be a damn tease when she wanted to be.

This really wasn't the time, however.

"What should we do?" Natsuki asked, closing her briefcase and pulling away from Shizuru enough to turn around and face her. Shizuru's face was pulled into one of those adorably pensive expressions that made Natsuki want kiss her senseless every time she allowed it to cross her face. Natsuki couldn't help herself, she leaned forward and gently kissed Shizuru's lips - completely forgoing whatever Shizuru's response to her question would be.

Shizuru responded in kind, drawing Natsuki in closer so as to kiss her in earnest. It was a spiraling, yet chase kiss, for neither of them, Natsuki guessed, really wanted to think about anything else.

A few moments later, Natsuki pulled away from Shizuru just long enough to gasp out, "Let's go to bed."

They'd been doing this for years, and yet every time Natsuki found herself saying those words, she felt like it was their first time once again. Her face would flush as bright red as it had that first night, and Shizuru would say something horrible, like '_red suits you'_ and Natsuki would blush anew. Still, nothing could compare to the sensation of that time. It had had been mired with the guilt and pain of the carnival, this time the sensation of drawing Shizuru back into her arms was just like coming home. They feared losing each other deeply, for their power came from each other.

Shizuru took Natsuki's hand and together they made their way down the hall towards their bedroom, pausing to make sure that Jun's bedroom door was firmly closed. They'd had their fair share of walk-ins from the boy over the years and neither of them really wanted to cope with explaining to Jun, yet again, about what it meant to be in love.

He was just too young to really understand, Shizuru kept on saying, when Natsuki would grumble about how the kid had the worst timing ever.

"Shizuru, I-" Natsuki began, closing the door behind them, but not locking it. It had taken a lot for Natsuki to feel comfortable enough with her surroundings to not sleep with a gun under her pillow, let alone leave the door unlocked. Shizuru had worked with her on it, acting as a silent protectorate against the nightmares and fear that Natsuki had carried around with her for a good half of her lifetime.

Natsuki closed her eyes and concentrated, trying to pick the words that would make this conversation seem less strange. She needed to ask Shizuru if there was any chance, any chance at all, that the madness would return.

"Natsuki's face is all screwed up, did I do something wrong?" Shizuru queried, unbuttoning her work shirt and draping it over a chair.

"It's not you." Natsuki muttered, sitting down hard on the bed. She didn't know how to put her feelings into words, especially because it so weighted on everything that was happening to them. "I just feel as though we shouldn't be doing this."

Shizuru moved across the room to sit down next to Natsuki and took her hand, "We made a decision to be in this together, right?"

"But what is this?" Natsuki asked, turning to look at Shizuru. "Who are we but players in someone else's grand game? That's what Midori told us tonight, we're nothing more than pawns."

Shizuru looked thoughtful for a moment, before smiling gently. She placed a finger on Natsuki's nose, "We must be pawns then, but remember, pawns are allowed to move two spaces on their first move."

Natsuki blinked, not understanding what Shizuru was talking about. She hadn't been thinking in terms of chess, and she was positively awful at the game, anyway, "What?"

Shizuru grinned, leaning in and kissing Natsuki, a faint brush of her lips against Natsuki's as she murmured, "We have the upper hand, at least until they realize we know."

Natsuki said nothing, but pulled her in closer, taking advantage of the embrace for as long as she could. Shizuru was warm and comforting and that was what Natsuki needed from her right now. They didn't know anything, and yet Shizuru had managed to see their advantage despite everything standing in their way.

Natsuki was thankful for every moment that she had with Shizuru. They were sacred.

They kissed for a long time, Natsuki content to not let it go any further than that. It was far too late at night for them to get into anything like that, and she didn't think her heart would be truly in it, as she was so bogged down by the worry of the coming days.

Still, as Shizuru removed her shirt and bra, Natsuki did not protest. This was a form of escapism as well. This is what Shizuru had turned to before the insanity of the carnival had gripped her subconscious so tightly that she became completely alien to Natsuki. Natsuki realized that she might have to coax her lover back to the realm of sanity.

Only this time, she was pretty sure that Shizuru wouldn't be the only one on that downward spiral. Together, they were bound to fall into that spiral. The madness was now written into their unconscious minds and neither of would be able to escape it, should it become a player in this new conflict again.

"I love you," Natsuki muttered, kissing her way down the curve of her lover's neck. She paused, looking up into Shizuru's lustful eyes, "Never forget that."

Shizuru said nothing, but gasped loudly as Natsuki's lips traveled further down her torso. They lingered at certain spots, Natsuki enjoying the reactions of her lover to her simple touch.

Shizuru had always been a most obliging lover, even when Natsuki's own inexperience had been something of a boundary to their lovemaking.

Still, her lack of answer bothered Natsuki, for usually a silent Shizuru meant that the woman was wrapped up in her own worrying about whatever problem they faced. Together they were a powerful force, and Natsuki needed the reassurance that they would remain that way, no matter what.

The madness was far too much of a threat to be ignored.

"Promise me," Natsuki stopped her lips just short of their prize. She knew that it was a cruel torture for her lover, to have to wait for what Natsuki was about to give her - but she had to have confirmation.

They were in this together.

"Anything," Shizuru gasped, and Natsuki bent to claim her just reward.

* * *

It was a phone call she'd been dreading, but one that she knew would be coming. Haruka had noticed the mark a few days before, and it was only a matter of time before the others caught wind of it, given Haruka's want to run her mouth.

Kikugawa Yukino stared hard at the caller ID on her phone for another shrill round of beeping, before picking it up, "This is Kikugawa," she began as professionally as she could, but her voice was shaking.

She was terrified of the woman on the other end of the line, for she had taken Haruka away.

Even if it was just for a short time, Yukino could not think a period of time where she'd been more lost and alone.

Haruka was her life, and that woman had ripped her away on the slightest chance that her secret would be discovered.

"Ah, Yukino, it's good to talk to you." That was not the voice of Fujino Shizuru, bur that of someone that Yukino had actually wanted to talk to.

"Natsuki?" She asked, incredulously, "What are you using Fujino's phone for?"

"I er-" Natsuki trailed off and Yukino could tell that she was inspecting her cell phone. "Shit, I'm sorry to have confused you."

"No matter," Yukino smiled, even though she knew that Natsuki could not see her. "Now, what did you want to talk about?"

Something told Yukino that her feeling of dread for Fujino would not be misplaced, for Natsuki's tone suggested that the panic was warranted anyway.


	8. Chapter 8

**Passages, Chapter Eight**

_AN - Sorry for the delay in getting this out, I got burried under a mountain of college work that was really not as fun as it looked at first. My arm still has graphite on it from my art project and I got an 80 on a test for political science. Basically, this story got back burnered while I figured out what I was doing in terms of school._

_But now I'm updating, but with the warning that I do have quite a bit going on this weekend and then midyears for the next week and a half or so. Updates, because of this, might be rather delayed._

_sorry.  
_

_**The story goes as follows: A section that was written by Natsuki ten years after the carnival, and then the present, five years later. **  
_

* * *

_It was Yukino that talked Nao into speaking to someone about her problems, at that last HiME-Sentai gathering before Midori left for the sates. To this day, I've no idea how she managed to pull it off - but I've come to accept the uneasy friendship that Nao and Yukino formed during the last years of high school. _

_High school was such a blur for me, once I managed to convince everyone that I was not a complete idiot. They told me that because I had poor attendance I could not possibly have learned enough to move on to the next year, despite the fact that I'd showed up for all the test and had done reasonably well. I guess the really meant it when they said school was hell, because no one could tell me what was going to happen to me for a good three months into my second year of high school. Eventually it seemed as though they'd just forgotten about me. _

_Like they did all the HiME. _

_We only had each other, and that was perhaps the most desperate bond we could have. For none of us wanted anything to do with any of the others at first. It was just too painful. _

_Wounds, it seemed, were sometimes the slow-bleeding type that simply allow for easy clotting. We were festering wounds, and we did not heal quickly enough for anyone to nice the changes in us since the carnival. _

_It was completely alien for me to think that any of the HiME would want to bond after what had happened during the carnival, but I think that some of the friendships were really desperately needed. Nao and Yukino bonded over their mutual experiences during those horrible days, and over their shared terror of the woman I now live with. I can understand them, and yet, on some level, I don't. They see a completely different side of the HiME than I do. _

_I've been told that I'm too cynical. I think that Nao might have had a point there. _

_Nao's ability to make friends has always been rather poor. I think that it had something to do with the fact that she'd been alone for almost as long as I had. There's no telling what a person will do if they simply lack the developmental processes to interact with others. Nao doesn't talk much about her friendships to anyone - but Yukino was the one who convinced her to talk to someone with the insights only gained by a medical degree. _

_She's seeing a shrink now and Yukino is too, if Shizuru's information is good. I'm not really sure how I feel about that, as they're a risk to us all if they accidentally let something spill. The HiME are all relatively public figures now, it would not do for us to be caught out in the open with our pants down. _

_  
First District is still out there, and they will take any excuse they can find to bring us down. _

_Still, the seeing the shrink thing greatly bothers me. I wish that both of them would talk to me instead. I really wish that Nao'd open up to me, because Yukino won't. No one tells me anything any more and I really find myself resenting it. _

_Shizuru's a closed book about the past now. I know that she doesn't want to think about what happened back then, because a lot of the people who died by her hands were not included in the final 'reset' of our lives. So many are dead, massacred in one of the most complicated unsolved cases of our time; and all at her hands. _

_She still has nightmares, but when I try to comfort her, she tells me I obsess too much about the past and that's usually the end of the conversation. _

_But things are moving, I know they are. _

_I refuse to believe that things are over for the HiME. We're too interconnected now to be just left alone by First District and Searrs. I know that we're supposed to be left alone now, the blank checks they signed for us were enough of an indicator of that, but I've the sinking suspicion that we have not seen the last of them. _

_Why would some of us still be able to use our abilities if there weren't some other need for us? Mikoto still carries Miroku around with her as though nothing's changed - and Akira I know can still summon her element as she nearly killed me that one time I arrived at Mai's unannounced. _

_Still, how do I explain it to Shizuru? She's in denial about the whole thing. _

_We have to be ready to fight, for it's only a matter of time, I know it._

* * *

_Five Years later. _

Kikugawa Yukino sighed as she cradled her cell phone to her ear and straightened her collar at the same time. She was on a time crunch and Natsuki could not have picked a worse time to call. The senator she worked for had to make a public statement in an hour and she had to coach him on what not to say, because the man was a big enough idiot to publicly bash his opponents before the primaries even started. He was bound to get eliminated before the competition really got tough at that rate.

He was too cocky, much like so many other people Yukino knew.

"Natsuki, I'm rather in a hurry, so if you could just tell me what's bothering you?" She asked, knowing that Natsuki would growl at her for rushing. She shuffled the papers on her desk, hunting for something to take notes on – as conversations with Natsuki usually lead to revelations about the HiME that Yukino often wanted to discuss at a later date.

It was amazing how well the HiME knew each other, really. She didn't want to know them that well, but she loved the friendships she'd formed with all of her compatriots. They were tied together though a terrible, horrible – wonderful – event that had shaped their present day characters and Yukino was convinced that it was for the best. They were some of the most important bonds she'd forged in her short life, far stronger than the bonds of her relationships now - save that of her friendship-turned-something-else with Haruka.

Yukino knew that Natsuki was on a hair trigger when it came to all things HiME related, for she'd always been. Haruka called it her weak point and her one downfall in the world of business. If anything came up regarding any of her past foes, Natsuki was among the first to jump off the gun and go after that information.

It was a poor weakness to have.

"Well," Natsuki sounded hesitant, but there was a tone of urgency in her voice that Yukino recognized. She braced herself; this was going to be big. Natsuki was never one to beat around the bush, except if she didn't know how to break the news to someone. Shouting '_we're all going to die'_ in someone's face was never the way to go, anyway. "Nao called me yesterday; she said that she'd summoned her elements the night before. She sounded so scared; I didn't know what to do. I called Mai and she came over and then Midori called saying that she expected this to happen."

Yukino gulped and pushed her glasses up her nose. She had to maintain her composure. She never got flustered, not any more. She wasn't an awkward teenager with a forbidden crush anymore - she was proud and she had to stand up tall.

She would not let the monster from the past come back to haunt her.

She was stronger than all that.

_But Nao summoned her elements? _

Yukino tried not to think too far into the implications of that statement. Being able to do that would destroy, positively destroy whatever calm Nao had been able to produce for herself over the years.

Nao was a special case for Yukino, for their friendship was built on their mutual need and fear of the power they once commanded. Yukino hated to think that she had the ability to kill with a mere word, and was thankful when the found herself, quite suddenly, without that power.

She'd managed to maintain that façade of calm and happiness for about a week.

After that, the joy of losing the 'worst part of herself' wore off and Yukino realized just how much she'd come to rely on Diana and what Diana stood for. Gone was the idea that she had something that could represent her love for Haruka. She had to create that feeling again, and it was that feeling itself (along with a few well-placed words by Fujino) that finally pushed Yukino into saying what she needed to say to Haruka in order to make her feelings known.

Theirs was not a happy relationship. Whereas Natsuki had her beloved Shizuru and everything was completely peachy between the two of them, Haruka and Yukino had to fight every step of the way. Their personalities match well, but both of them were willful and stubborn, Yukino just chose to be less open about it. They worked for their relationship, however, because they knew that they only had each other in this brave new world, and that was enough for the two of them.

Yukino really had grown to understand the reason why her friendship with Haruka, and then her later relationship with the woman drove a wedge between the HiME and herself. Only Nao seemed to understand, and that was because once she turned her life around, Haruka would give her the time of day.

That was all Nao ever needed.

But now, with the idea that she could once again fall into that deep pit of madness and despair was almost too much for Nao, most like, and that was why she had called Natsuki in the first place.

Natsuki had the answers that no one else did, when it came to HiME business; as Midori was out of the country at the moment. If Yukino remembered correctly, she was studying some ancient natives of the Americas, looking for clues as to the origins of the Ikusahime legend.

"How is she?" Yukino demanded almost without thinking. Nao's wellbeing was paramount, for if Nao was not okay, then Yukino needed to be there with her, to help her though the crisis.

Like she'd done so many other times.

"She's fine. She was just shaken up from when I called her this morning." Natsuki sounded harassed, as though she didn't want to believe the story she was spilling either. Yukino understood that, for Natsuki was one of the few individuals she knew who could feel guilty for nothing at all.

Sometimes Yukino thought she got into the wrong line of work. The business world simply wasn't cut out for people like her. Natsuki was still too awkward at time, and too friendly, to really get along well in her corner office on the top floor.

Haruka would sometimes marvel at how quickly Natsuki had climbed the rungs of the corporate ladder, even bypassing that glass ceiling that Japan had grown so famous for in recent years for trying to break down.

Some things were just built into a society, Yukino realized long ago after an argument with one of her former clients about his treatment of the women on his campaign staff. It was not right for anyone to try and change things in one giant leap, for the process was far more gradual. Yukino hated to advocate sexism, but sometimes she did understand why the change was so slow coming in Japan.

Society was hard to change.

"That's good to hear." Yukino returned warmly. She grinned a little, even though she knew Natsuki could not see her face, mobile phone technology had yet to advance that far, but they were working on it. Her face turned more serious as she asked, "So what are we going to do?" Nao's summoning her element was just another in a long trend of events that suggested to Yukino that the HiME's duty was not yet over.

"Midori seems to think that the HiME are somehow connected to some other epic battle to end all battles, and out strength comes from our bonds with each other instead of with our most important person."

"That makes no sense." Yukino muttered.

"Tell me about it." Natsuki agreed. "But as its Midori, she's most likely got two or three years worth of research behind these ideas and we'd best to not ignore them."

"True." Yukino hated to play the skeptic, but honestly, who was going to do it if not for her? Nao was already completely on board with whatever explained what was going on and Natsuki had to sell it to everyone else. "But I refuse to believe that something big is going to happen to us again. We're not in high school any more, this is something best left to the younger generation."

Natsuki was silent.

Yukino realized that she'd tread on a line that she should not have crossed. The younger generation, Jun and Arisa's generation, as well as all the kids that Yukariko had popped out, was still far too young to have to worry about HiME business.

No, best leave that to the seasoned professionals.

"So are we having a meeting?"

"Yes. Usual time and place."

"Alright."

* * *

The therapist did not look amused as Nao filed her nails while grinning at him. Natsuki had suggested that she speak to someone about the problems she had with her life in general - to see if talking about them would help her out. Nao would have loved to talk to Natsuki, or ever that blasted Fujino woman about her problems, but certainly not this sorry excuse for a man. He sat hunched over his notes, scribbling indecipherable kanji and doodling as Nao poured her (very much edited) life story out to him.

The bastard wasn't even bothering to write it down.

Nao had realized that she needed to talk to someone quite a bit more than before, especially if the deep seeded issues of the Carnival were beginning to resurface.

"Natsuki's being so nice to me, but I don't know why." Nao continued. "She's always been so kind to me, in comparison to everyone else. I don't know what I ever did to deserve that kind of treatment. I've been nothing but a shit to her ever since we met."

"Perhaps she values your friendship with her more than you do her's?" The therapist asked mildly.

Nao frowned, she knew that without asking. Kuga Natsuki had, in recent years, become the sort to move past wrongs on times long gone and look to the good in people. Nao had no idea where she'd lost her vindictive personality, but somehow it had given way to something that Nao could not quite place.

Her phone beeped. She pulled it out without thinking and flipped it open to read the new text message.

"Same time, same place, same crowd. Try and do it again."

She smiled, oh yes; she'd love to summon them again.


	9. Chapter 9

**Passages, Chapter Nine**

Sorry for the really really long delay on getting this out, I had to decide what I wanted to do with the plot. I love domestic NatShiz, by the way. So fucking much.

* * *

_The first night that Jun came to live with us; we had to spend the night in a hotel room. It was my fault that we wound up in such a situation, really, but Shizuru, to this day, says that you cannot blame anything but fate for such providence. I personally think that she just says things like that to mess with me. _

_She's hardly a religious person, and most of the time she just goes along with the Western or Japanese holiday of the time for the excuse to celebrate. I'd hate to think that she has nothing in her life that is truly worth celebrating, but Shizuru has always told me that she loves a good party._

_We did our fair share of partying while we were both undergrads, but as graduate students, there's really just not the time. Most of those parties ended up with me drunk off my ass and Shizuru pleasantly tipsy in a random dark corner or bed. _

_I hate to think of all those times we very nearly got caught._

_We have to be careful with Jun, because I know that even though Japan is growing more progressive, the old mentality still lingers. Shizuru could lose the chance of ever being employed, as could I; if the way we were ever to get out into the public. Ours is a secret that we keep closely guarded among friends – mostly old friends from Fuuka who have even darker secrets than sexuality buried in their psyches._

_I worry that they'll take Jun away from us, should they ever find out about us. Shizuru has been careful, oh so careful; in the past few months – as have I. _

_I don't want to lose Jun before I even get to know him properly._

_We'd taken him out to eat after beginning the long and tiresome process of taking him into our lives. He was a quiet child, silently following us with adoring eyes and a bright smile that really didn't suit his personality. He was so like us, with hidden depth and secrets of his own that he fit with us perfectly._

_The state-run children's home was located almost across the prefecture; in the heart of a city that neither of us had any real familiarity with. Shizuru had researched the city on the Internet, and had found a few good places to eat – and I'd suggested we all go out to a fancy restaurant to celebrate the beginning of our new lives together._

_We had a place in mind, but we wound up getting lost somewhere in the heart of the city, far away from any landmarks that I recognized._

_I'm far more an outskirts sort of person, anyway. There are too many people at the center of a city for me. I prefer the solitude of our apartment, far away from chaos of all those people._

_Shizuru always laughs at me when I mention my preferences and tells me that if I want to be a hermit, that I can do it on my own time. _

_We're in this together._

_She needs the people; she needed Jun far more than I did. He is like a canvas for her to practice her teachings on, and a way for her to be a mother to another person._

_It doesn't do to function as the mother of the woman you're sleeping with, we've discovered. _

_He was such a darling, following us around with wide eyes as we tried to figure out which train line would take us even remotely close to home. _

_By the time we'd puzzled out the nighttime routes, the last train had long since come and gone and we were stuck._

_I knew that Nao still lived somewhere nearby, but Shizuru refused to call her._

_Nao and Shizuru play off each other like oil and water – they're so different that they simply _cannot _have anything in common with each other for fear of actually liking something that would be considered taboo to the other. I think that their antagonism is really quite foolish, but no matter what I say to either of them, I get the same answer._

_It's not my fight, not my place; I couldn't understand. _

_I _do _understand what they're both going through, and I can be content to play both sides, if I must._

_I wish I didn't, as it falls to me to play the peacemaker and I'm far too invested in both of them to simply pick a side. _

_Sometimes I really wish I could, however._

_Shizuru hates Nao for what she did to me during the carnival - and I think she always will. Shizuru's vindictive like that. _

_I wonder if she knows that it's really bad for everyone, her personal problems with certain members of our circle of friends. We all poison our relationships with each other with the memories of those horrible days; but Nao and Shizuru take it a step further._

_Sometimes I feel as though Nao deserves it._

* * *

Five Years later.

She could still do it.

The blades on the tips of her fingers flashed quickly into existence and Nao flexed her knuckles pensively, testing her suddenly returned powers. It was a good feeling, but not one that she had expected to actually be able to achieve. She was thinking along the lines of Kuga - if she couldn't still do it, where was the harm? It was only in the action that the elements had become dangerous.

What had changed?

She snapped her fingers.

The wires shot out in either direction, looping neatly around the two trees that she was standing between.

Interesting.

She pulled, testing her strength. She wasn't a little girl any more, and using a weapon like this felt awkward. It was too light, and too easy to move with it. She needed a challenge, something that she could grasp more easily between her two hands.

Something like a club.

Still, the wires were a sign that she could still summon her elements. Nao relished in the notion that she still had the power to do something that she had almost written off as a moment for her worst childhood nightmares. Finding that she still had the skill to use he elements meant that she was powerful enough to determine her own destiny once again, and she had not felt that high since middle school.

Her lip curled upward and she yanked down hard on the wires, the twin tree-limbs severing in one neat, straight, perfect cut.

She could get used to this.

The leaves of the fallen tree limb fell around her as she brought her claws up to her lips. The metal tasted salty to her tongue, and yet she dragged her lips down the entirety of her claw. "Showtime," she muttered, and turned on her heel, leaving the clearing and the devastation of claws behind her.

* * *

The meeting was brief, they all had lives to get back to, but the general consensus was that their powers were returning. It was so strange for them to sit together in one room and openly admit that they were changing for the worse once more. All of them, it seemed, except for Natsuki. No matter what she tried, her guns would not return.

Natsuki missed the feel of those guns in her hands, for they were an expression of power that she sometimes felt she lacked in the general chaos of her daily life. She'd started carrying her _other_ guns, the ones that fired real, not ice, bullets.

Natsuki knew that she really shouldn't be doing that, for those guns could hurt real humans; not just the monsters of her memories.

She sat in the kitchen, casting wary glances at Shizuru, who was pacing the length of the hallway, chatting with Yukariko, who was just leaving. She couldn't stand facing her lover having admitted that she could still not summon her elements.

_Does this mean I don't love her any more?_

Natsuki didn't think that could be the case, it didn't even make logical sense, for she loved Shizuru with every fiber of her body. That was a fact that would not change any time in the near future.

But then why did she feel so worried?

"Natsuki?" Shizuru leaned on the doorframe and tried to look as reassuring as she could, but Natsuki could tell the weight of the situation rested heavily on her as well. There was just too little that they knew right now, and everyone was suddenly coming back into their own. This was no time to be loosing morale.

"Mmm?" Natsuki responded, not looking from the suddenly very interesting pattern of wood-grain on the table. She couldn't bring herself to look at Shizuru, for there was so much shame attached to her inability to act as a HiME. She had every right to feel ashamed, for she definitely was one of the poorest liars she knew; her face would betray her hurt if she risked looking at Shizuru.

"I wouldn't worry," She said, placing a comforting hand on Natsuki's shoulder, "You'll find your center once again, we all do."

"Did you..." Natsuki trailed off, not knowing how to voice her question.

"Did I ever loose my ability to summon my element?" Shizuru supplied with a friendly tone in her voice. Natsuki turned her head and met the sad gaze of her lover. This was the ultimate betrayal, to admit that perhaps Shizuru was no longer the person most important to her in the world.

_Who was then?_

"Yes." Natsuki affirmed, meeting Shizuru's gaze head on. It hurt to do this. "Please, just tell me."

Shizuru looked as sad as Natsuki felt, "It never went away. I never lost it."

"Why?" Natsuki wondered. Shizuru gave her a questioning look. "Why didn't you tell me?"

There was a moment, of sudden tension that both of them most likely remembered quite well. They rarely fought, and when they did it was about trivial matters, but still, the idea of Shizuru keeping something like that, something that big from her blew Natsuki away.

Shizuru said nothing, meeting Natsuki's accusatory stare squarely, as though she was not afraid of the potential fall-out of this conversation. "I did not tell you because you are far too important to me to lose you to a ghost of the past."

"The carnival is hardly a ghost." Natsuki shot back, "It's real and it's going to be starting again. I can't do anything to stop it."

"Perhaps Natsuki is trying too hard?" Shizuru ventured.

Natsuki wanted to scream. Shizuru was so logical, everything made sense when it came to her, if it was good for Natsuki, it was good for Shizuru.

That was really an oversimplification of their relationship, but Natsuki was the first to admit that the two of them were so hopelessly in love with each other that their relationship was based so much more on faith than fights.

Nao called them disgusting.

That was Nao; however, she had her own share of relationship and commitment issues.

Natsuki sighed heavily, "I'm sorry, it's not your fault I can't do this."

Shizuru moved her arm from Natsuki's shoulder and pulled her lover into a standing up position, "I wonder if you simply don't want to. We have the perfect life here, and this carnival is threatening to change everything we've built our existence on."

Natsuki leaned forward, resting her head on Shizuru's shoulder, "I don't want that. I don't want any of this."

Shizuru offered Natsuki the little comfort that a simple gesture could, and Natsuki felt her heart lift slightly. There had to be some explanation as to why she suddenly could not summon her elements. Shizuru was her whole world, and nothing could change that, no matter what some cosmic event had to say about it.

"I'm really shocked he didn't wake up during that meeting," Shizuru mused, glancing in the direction of the hallway. Natsuki wondered if she felt that a change in subject would be safer for her than perhaps continuing to dwell on the subject. Both of them knew that there was a good chance that there were greater implications to what was implied by Natsuki's sudden inability to perform as a HiME. "He must have been very tired."

"You were the one who decided to have western-style turkey for dinner. There's stuff in it that makes you sleepy." Natsuki chuckled. She could handle herself in this conflict, and she did not want to think of what Shizuru's over-active imagination might be getting to.

"Perhaps I did it for a reason." Shizuru tapped her chin thoughtfully, "You're meeting again Yuuki tomorrow for lunch right?"

"Weekly check up as her sponsor for that program she's in, I have to." Natsuki shook her head. Nao always needed taken care of, even when she seemed to be self-sufficient. There were only so many drugs a person could put into their system during college before they caught up with you. Nao was trying to hold down her job by keeping a low profile; but it was only a matter of time before her past caught up with her and she would up getting 'laid off' because of budget cuts or some other made up excuse.

"She's been clean for years, Natsuki." Shizuru shook her head, "I wish you'd stop seeing her."

"She's a friend, Shizuru."

"She tried to kill you. Several times." Shizuru pointed out. They were now moving the remnants of the mugs of tea and coffee that they'd made for their guests on their late-night meeting.

"You succeeded in killing me." Natsuki shot back.

She instantly regretted saying the words. "I didn't mean that, not like that." The words tumbled out of her mouth in a desperate attempt to make sure that Shizuru knew that Natsuki would never, ever, hold Shizuru accountable for the events of that night in the church.

"Your meaning was perfectly clear." Shizuru's voice was calm, collected, cool; empty. Anything but the emotions that Natsuki knew were running through her lover at the moment. She could not believe her stupidity and arrogance.

She took a step forward, and then another. Slowly, she forced herself to stand before her love and look into those hurt eyes. They'd drifted apart and now, more than ever, Natsuki felt the urge to bring them together. She needed to be near her love, before time ran out for the both of them.

"Shizuru." Natsuki began, reaching out and touching the taller woman's arm.

Shizuru flinched. "Don't do this."

"Do what?" Natsuki demanded. She was starting to get angry, which was never a good sign when it came to their interactions. More often than not, annoyance came first for Natsuki. Anger was rare when it came at all.

She took a deep breath. "I'm sorry."

"I know." Shizuru's tone was the same, but there was a light in her eyes that had not been there before. Natsuki took that to mean something positive.

"Why do we always do this?"

"I don't know, Natsuki, I don't know." Shizuru took Natsuki's hand in her own and drew it up to her chest. "We shouldn't be doing this."

"I know."

"I just hate it when you go to see her."

Natsuki knew this was true, Shizuru had made her opinions _very_ clear on the subject, but now that Natsuki knew that both Shizuru and Nao could summon up weapons at will; she was slightly more concerned.

"It's my duty as a friend."

And that's all it was.

Duty.


	10. Chapter 10

**Passages, Chapter Ten**

Okay. Who are these 'thirteen' year olds who keep writing NatShiz porn? Get off the Internet, you're too young.

* * *

_In my life, there are not a lot of people that I can hands down say that I would trust. I'm not a trusting person. It doesn't come easily to me. _

_Most of the people who call themselves my friends know that they have to work long and hard to actually get close to me. Shizuru worked the longest - and I can never seem to repay her enough for loving me just for being me. _

_First District and Searrs tried to rip that love away from me in its infancy. I would have none of it. _

_I'm sick of people looking at me oddly, telling me that it is unnatural for a woman of my years to not have a steady man in my life. _

_I don't want a man. _

_People at the engineering school don't get a woman working her way through their ranks almost as much as they fail to understand my complicated love life. _

_I honestly don't think it to be that complicated a story. I simply go from one place to the next with the practiced precision of one who knows me. I have friends, and they accept me for who I am; but no one outside of a select group of individuals really knows me. _

_I like it that way. _

_If someone knew me the way they did, I would be scared for my self. I am a private person, Shizuru, Mai, any of my friends, really, would be the first to tell you that. _

_I only really open up to two people. _

_Shizuru, because I have to. She'd know if I was not completely honest with her, its one of those strange sixth-senses that she's developed through years of knowing me all too well. _

_I want to think that she returns the favor, but she's so closed that I sometimes can't tell what she's thinking. So often my indicators are just a twitch of the lip of a smile that means something that the previous one did not. _ _Reading__ Shizuru is a lot like reading a book in English. I know that I should be able to do it, and I've had lots of training in the subject - but when it comes down to it, I get performance anxiety and all that comes out is a mush of gibberish that might make sense of a psychologist, but not to me. _

_The most aggravating part is that Shizuru will then smile that closed little smile of her's and I'm stuck trying to figure out what she's laughing at. _

_It almost never works. _

_Despite all of her misgivings, I love that about Shizuru. I love that she's still a puzzle that I have to work my way through - even if she is an exceedingly aggravating one. _

_Nao is my other puzzle. The one that I've solved enough times to be sure that I can put the pieces together no problem. Nao hates that I can read her so easily, but it's her own fault, really. _

_She's not that complex a person. _

_She's become something like a little sister to all of us since the Carnival. Her mother woke from the coma she'd been in since Nao's primary school days and wanted nothing to do with the young woman her little girl had grown up into. _

_Nao came crying to me about the injustice of it all, and I could do nothing for her but support her in any way I could. _

_She's a broken doll sometimes, that needs to be cared for. _

_More than even Mikoto, Nao has become all of our little sister since the end of the carnival. We take care of her; make sure that she's not getting into trouble. _

_Me more than anyone else. _

_She was right, that night when she told us that we were the same. We are the same, we have the same sort of odd humor that no one else understands, and the same jaded outlook on the world. _

_She's just more bitter than I am about, well, everything. _

_I try to take care of her, because I know she's bound to get into trouble some time. I have to watch her; she's too precious to everyone, too central to this great plot that we're somehow a part of. _

_Nao played a far greater role than anyone expected in the carnival, and we all realized that it was because none of us saw her as a real, creditable threat - just a girl with nothing to lose and a whole lot of bones to pick. _

_Nothing out of the ordinary, really. _

_Still, I have to protect her, from everyone, but mostly from herself. _

_There are only so many chemicals you can put into your body before something rebels._

* * *

_Five Years Later. _

Natsuki took her bike into work for the first time the following morning. She needed the excuse to ride her bike and the morning drive would give her a chance to think things through; as she and Shizuru were walking on thin ice.

Natsuki hated it when they fought. It was always about the stupid, inconsequential things.

Like Natsuki's continuing friendship with Nao.

She needed the ride, for it was something that she could channel all of her attention into something that was not fretting about the fact that she'd managed to piss Shizuru off quite spectacularly with only five misplaced words.

She couldn't keep doing this to herself.

She kicked the bike into a higher gear and gunned the engine. She could do this.

She was old enough that she could tell her underlings to lay off when she wore leather pants and rode a motorcycle to work. Brand disloyalty was everything in the company, but Natsuki knew that she would be blowing more mindless salarymens' brains with the concept that she was even riding a bike to work.

Let alone the leather pants.

Most of her co-workers suspected that she was just another stuffed shirt from a high-ranking college in Kyoto.

_This should show them. _

There was a grim satisfaction in Natsuki's actions, because she knew better than most what it felt like to wear a mask of the 'bad girl' that seemed to so fascinate her coworkers.

Still, she looked more like one of the motorcycle models than the woman who designed them in this get up.

What the fuck was she thinking?

Her secretary was busy filing when she got into the office, and Natsuki tossed her jacket onto the back of the spare chair in her office along with her helmet before settling down to contemplate exactly what her next move would be.

They were in the middle of setting the parameters around which their 'bikes could run - to comply with Japan's newest set of emissions standards. Natsuki was well-versed in electrical mechanics, and she could not understand, for the life of her, why they did not simply go electric all together.

It was far more economical for most of their customers to run electronic machines; and with the persistent lack of oil in the world, the gas prices were not making it easy for their target demographic to afford their product.

The advertising department had been all over this, and marketing did not know how to solve this problem.

They were stuck.

Natsuki tipped her chair backwards and let the file come to rest on her nose. There had to be a logical way to do this. The company's CEOs, along with most of the shareholders (mostly Americans, that could have been the problem), wanted nothing to do with the potential of creating a 'green product.' So far, the proposals to switch over to hybrid technology had been shot down completely.

Natsuki was quite at a loss as to what to do.

Her office phone chirped and her secretary's brisk voice came over the intercom, "Miss Kuga? There is a Nao Yuuki on the phone for you, to confirm your lunch time appointment?"

Natsuki leaned over and hit the speak button on the phone, "Put her through."

The phone was silent for a few seconds, and then it rang once more. Natsuki picked it up and waited for the tell-tale click of her secretary hanging up before speaking, "You confirm appointments now?"

"No, it was just that you and Fujino seemed to be on thin ice last night. Is this a good idea?" Nao sounded distracted.

"How the fuck did you pick up on that, we hadn't even fought yet." Natsuki demanded.

"Oh, Kuga, I'm unnaturally perceptive." Nao laughed, and then the sound was muffled. Nao was speaking to someone else; most likely barking at them for bothering her while she was on the phone.

Such behavior was typical of Nao at work.

"Sorry about that, you wouldn't believe the amount of bullshit that goes on in this place on a day to day basis." Nao sighed, "Look, I'm not risking my skin for a free meal if Fujino decides that today is the day that she finally snaps and kills me for real."

Natsuki's face fell. She'd been rather looking forward to pouring her heart out to Nao. The redhead had grown up to be a spectacular listener as long as you were willing to return the favor. "We do sort of have to have this conversation."

"Only as the organization dictates and I've been clean for years, Kuga. Missing meeting isn't going to kill us." Nao's tone suggested that there was no room for negotiation on this matter. She was not about to risk having anything happen to her, Natsuki guessed, not after all that she'd been through to ensure that that never happened again.

"Nao." Natsuki tried not to sound too annoyed.

"I'm not risking it. Not even for you, Kuga." Natsuki could picture the redhead's determinedly stubborn face and the fact that she was most likely pouting seemed to do nothing to deter Natsuki from asking, once again, if she'd perhaps reconsider.

The silence on the other end of the line was deafening. Nao was clearly shocked that she would persist. Natsuki wasn't really the type to do something like that.

Theirs was more of a friendship of convenience.

"I'm coming to get you." Natsuki said shortly, grabbing her keys and standing up. "Be ready."

She wished that she had some way of ordering Nao around, for it would make her life so much easier if she did. Theirs was a relationship that did not require such controls - even though there were times when both of them wished they could have such control.

Natsuki was just used to taking the crap.

Now she wanted to give it back.

Shizuru would never hurt Nao, not any more, not since that night. They were complete now, and Nao had nothing to do with them.

She was just the added baggage of an event that should have been long forgotten.

"I'm going out." Natsuki said shortly to her secretary and the small man jumped. She was usually a lot nicer to her staff, but today she was in a foul mood to begin with and Nao was trying to avoid her. "Hold my calls."

"How long to you plan on being gone?" The man called after her.

Natsuki gave an overly-dramatic shrug of her shoulders.

_How the fuck do I know?_

* * *

Nao was waiting. For what she did not know, but she knew that it would have to come sooner rather than later - just because of the nature of how these things happened to her. Kuga was pissed at her for not wanting to have their usual weekly meet-up, but Nao was not taking any chances.

If Fujino was angry, even the slightest wrong move on Kuga's part could send her into a frenzy the likes of which had not been seen for nearly fifteen years.

After last night, Nao realized that Fujino could still summon her element and the thought of having to fight with her was even more terrifying.

Fujino could have won the carnival.

Everyone knew it, but no one talked about it. Nao was just the odd man out, stating what was on everyone's minds so that they did not have to.

She hated playing that role.

The roar of a motorcycle caught her ears and Nao looked up from the pavement she'd been studying.

It made sense, the one day that Kuga broke her unbreakable routine would be the day the world came to an end and dissolved into chaos.

It was so typical of Kuga.

The motorcycle skidded to a halt in front of Nao and she found herself with a helmet shoved in her hands, "Get on." Kuga growled.

Nao stood there for a minute, staring at Kuga and wondering what exactly it was that was bothering her so much that she had to practically force this conversation. "That bad, huh?" She muttered, shoving the helmet onto her head. She was thankful that Kuga had finally bought another helmet. She'd spend a good portion of her youth terrified that she was going end up with her head split open on the pavement.

It seemed that Fujino had finally talked some sense into Kuga.

_Took long enough. _

Nao climbed into the back of the bike, suddenly very conscious that wearing a skirt to work had not been the best idea this morning, and grabbed Kuga around the waist.

There was a certain level of closeness that existed between the two of them, a forbidden level of their friendship that Nao refused to admit and Kuga did not acknowledge.

That was a can of worms that no one wanted open.

Nao hung on her life as Kuga navigated the streets of the city with little respect to the traffic laws or anything else for that matter. She had a destination in mind, obviously, and she needed to get there before everything was too late.

Kuga pulled into a side alley and was soon racing though what appeared to be one of those half-constructed 'green' buildings that were popping up all over the place. Nao hated to think just how a building could be green, as she knew how expensive they were to construct in relationship of a regular building.

Out of nowhere came a white-hot bold of energy and Kuga swerved to miss it. Over the roar of the motorcycle's engine, Nao could hear the woman swear loudly. They skidded to the left and Nao watched as the seeming-fireball knocked out three of the support beams for the floor above them.

Everything creaked ominously.

They slowed and peered through the gloom, "What was that?" Nao asked hesitantly, knowing that the chances of something bad happening were very high. It was always in places like this that bad things happened.

"Midori said that the attacks would begin again." Kuga mumbled, reaching behind her, in-between their two bodies to pull what appeared to be a handgun out from her waistband. Nao tried to back away, for she did not want to descend into the level of inappropriate touching and Nao was not prepared to risk that. She clicked the safety off and cocked the gun, expertly loading a bullet into the chamber.

"Is this really an attack?" Nao mused, still looking around.

There was a dull roar and suddenly something very large and ugly pushed forward out from behind a pile of debris and lunged.

"Shit!" Kuga swore and kicked the bike into gear once more. The tires squealed and the smell of burnt rubber filled their noses.

Nao coughed and struggled to hang on. Kuga was a genius on a 'bike alone, but with a passenger it was hard for her to keep up the level of control that she boasted while riding alone. "Should I get off?" Nao shouted into Kuga's helmet, not sure if the words would make it through the thick plastic.

Kuga said nothing but gunned the engine further.

Nao took it as a sign to get off.

As Kuga drove around a particularly nasty-looking pile of bent metal and scraps of wood, Nao allowed herself to fall backwards off of the motorcycle, her claws extending as the monster surged forward. She closed her eyes and allowed pure instinct to take over; she hadn't, and yet she had, been doing this for ages.

The monster, neither of them was ready to call it an Orphan, skidded to a halt, confused as to why its single target suddenly had become two.

Nao took the opportunity to lunge forward, her claws slicing through the tender flesh of the creature's underbelly. She tucked into a roll and dove out of the way as it roared and lurched towards her; flailing in pain.

"Kuga!" She shouted, peering around through a haze of red hair that had fallen into her eyes. Her helmet must have fallen off when she attacked.

She could not see the motorcycle, or its driver, anywhere.

The monster roared loudly once more and moved in a strange sort of scuttling motion, trying to figure out where its quarry had gone. It did not seem particular fazed by the fact that it's innards were now dropping down onto the floor from the gash that Nao had made in it's underbelly.

Nao certainly noticed, however; for they smelled like rotten eggs and all other sorts of unmentionable things that Nao would have preferred to never have to smell again.

It was the smell of the Orphans – the stench of rotting flesh and decay. The smell that had haunted Nao's dreams for almost as long as the dead eyes of Fujino.

She cursed.

The monster was rolling into action once more. Scuttling from right to left as it tried to find a way of movement that did not aggravate its wounds; the monster began to make a loud hissing noise that set the hair on the back of Nao's neck straight up. Nao backed up, trying to fall into the shadows as instinct dictated, but there were no shadows here. Only bare concrete and nowhere to go.

Nao gulped. The monster was pressing forward once more, its claws moving through the air far faster than Nao was prepared to dodge them.

She had to work quickly.

A gunshot rang out, and then another.

_Figures Kuga'd have a semi_. Nao didn't know what kind of gun Kuga carried for the simple reason that she was averse to knowing what exactly Kuga did to 'protect' herself from whatever evils she thought still lurked in the darkness. _Certainly not this guy._

The orange-colored flesh to the side of the monster's head exploded in ribbons of flesh, blood and guts. Nao's nose wrinkled, but still the hissing noise the monster was making did not stop. If anything it was getting louder.

"Nao!" Kuga shouted, and the sound confused the wounded and bleeding monster even more. It was preparing for something; Nao could see that, but what she did not know.

_It's like a battery_.

_It has to charge before it can release that energy blast._

_Fuck._

Nao threw herself to the side, knowing that she had to get out of the corner she'd backed into. Kuga's gun didn't seem to be doing any major damage and Nao did not want to risk having to claw her way out and around this creature to safety.

Suddenly, the hissing stopped. Nao felt her jaw fall open as the wounded creature before her opened its jaws and let out a shriek that could have woken the dead. Its jaws opened to reveal rows of hideously pointed teeth as its throat worked at something.

Something white, something burning.

Nao's panic grew as she tried to get out of the way of the blast, there was no way to avoid it, but if she could just get around the pile of debris, she might have a chance at surviving. Even as the metal and wood cut into her hands, desperation made her continue forward.

_I won't die like this. _

She knew what would happen if she did.

Fujino would never forgive her.

Sudden she heard something, a sound that she had not heard in years.

Like one of those children's toys, the tubes that made that noise when you flip them over.

Kuga's guns.


	11. Chapter 11

**Passages, Chapter Eleven**

_AN - I find it very interesting that the moment I move this story into a more interesting direction for me - such as exploring the Shizuru-Natsuki-Nao dynamic as it was presented in the show and then aged fifteen years in this fic; I get a lot of reviews telling me that '_I'd better'_ not let this go in a NatNao direction. Like I would do that. This story is such that everything is a means to an end and I urge you all, the readership, to just sit back and let what comes, come._

_Also - is it strange that I feel compelled to write about Kruger after writing too much Kuga? I mean, they're the same age now, so it works quite well to write one or the other in this fic, but still. I miss Kruger. I found this video on youtube recently, it was like an ode to how much she failed at life. I loled a lot. _

* * *

_There are times when I don't know what people want from me. When I don't know how to act. _

_I hate those times._

* * *

_Five years later._

The monster - _orphan_, Nao supposed that she could call it by what it was, even if she wanted to deny its existence - roared in pain as it found itself neatly broken into several large pieces by well-aimed ice bullets. Blood and gore rained down around her and she flung a hand up to cover her face, for the orphan's blood stung to the touch.

Nao could see Kuga standing off to one side, the swirling protons around her hands firing off bullet after bullet at the monster. She felt her heart swell with pride that those bullets were being fired with the sole intension of saving her life.

_Where's your lover now, Fujino?_ The vindictive part of Nao's brain cackled, elated with the prospect of finally proving to Kuga once and for all that she was the better catch. Nao never understood where her attraction to Kuga came from; it was something that she'd tried to reason several times to no luck. It was just an illogical part of her brain, a remnant of a time when she might have actually acted upon what those impulses told her to do.

The calmer, more logical part of Nao's brain was screaming, however. This went against everything in Nao's world - this simple selfless act of Kuga's. She would not have it.

Kuga was running towards her now, shouting – slipping on the blood of the monster she'd killed, wanting to know if Nao was alright.

Nao brought her claws up to her face, examining them. She had to look at her element, for she could not face the fear of meeting Kuga's eyes and having everything come out. After that particular display of power, Nao was pretty sure that she could not trust herself to speak, let alone look at Kuga right now.

She'd calm down in time, but right now, she just needed Kuga to go.

_What would she say if she knew?_

"Just... Just go." She couldn't bring herself to meet Kuga's eyes. She was raw and terrified, but she could not bring herself to look at Kuga - the betrayal in her eyes would be final then.

She'd armed herself with the notion that she was alone in the world. Kuga's bond with her was just something that could be argued or reasoned away.

Kuga said nothing, as if the sensation of betrayal was thick with her as well.

"Damn it all," Nao cursed, kicking the lump of dead orphan closest to her.

She would not step between the lovers.

It was not her place in this game.

* * *

Natsuki was running on pure adrenaline. She had to get out of there. The creature, whatever it was, was dead and her presence was not helping either herself or Nao adjust to the harsh reality of what had just happened. The orphan had come out of nowhere; attacking them with clearly no idea that they were HiME, let alone the notion that they were armed.

Ever since the former director of the school and that little shit Nagi had disappeared off of the face of the earth, there had been only a handful of times that Natsuki had found herself wanting for the annoying little man's cryptic way of warning her and the others of the dangers to come. This, unfortunately, was one of those times.

Even a cryptic warning would be better than acting blind as they were now. They had no idea when to expect and attack, or even what cause them. All they knew was that there were suddenly monsters out for their blood once again.

_This isn't fucking Sailor Moon or Super Sentai._ Natsuki thought angrily as she urged her motorcycle still faster. _We don't have the ability to patrol the area, looking for fights like they did. _

_We're adults. We have lives._

_Red light._

Natsuki jerked her head to clear it and slammed on her breaks, stopping just before the white line on the asphalt. The only thing that she could think of that would make this day any worse would be getting a speeding ticket on top of everything else. Cops in this part of town were real sticklers to the rules as well, there was _no_ way that Natsuki's leather pants and tight jacket could talk her out of this one.

She was heading home, desperate to get away from Nao and the confusion of what had just happened; but the thought that that might not be the best idea was quickly racing through her head, fast enough to tell her that she would be far better off guarding herself and Nao from any potential repercussions that came from Shizuru discovering the true cause of her panic.

She had to talk to someone. And Shizuru was not an option.

It had been years since Natsuki had run to Mai with any sort of major problem, but the orange-haired woman was perhaps her best bet in a time like this.

Mai was steady and understood these sorts of things. She had the strength to tell Natsuki the truth when most of Natsuki's other friends would have simply told her what she wanted to hear. Perceptive as that was, Natsuki knew that she wanted someone to spin her the straight story now, not some convoluted piece of opinionated garbage.

She was pretty sure that Mai would be willing to do just that as well. She was a powerful force in most of their lives, and she had been central to the carnival as well.

The traffic light that she'd been idling in front of flashed green and Natsuki gunned her motorcycle's engine once more. She was not in the mood for traffic right now, and even it meant that she took the long way to Mai's place, she would do so.

She needed to think.

_Why did they come out for Nao?_ Duran had been nowhere in sight, but the guns that she'd missed so much had appeared almost as though they'd never been gone.

Natsuki had emptied her entire clip of bullets into the monster's head back there, and then had thrown her gun away without a thought. Her thoughts had been on getting the two of them out of there alive, to provide the opportunity for at least one of them to get out and tell the other HiME what had happened.

Nao was fighting well below her potential, Natsuki had realized when the redhead had gotten herself cornered by the creature just as it was revving up for a high-impact attack.

What a fool that girl was.

Natsuki didn't know what she was thinking of, or where it had come from.

Just a moment in time where she'd remembered that once, long ago, she'd been able to control her own destiny. She'd clung to that sensation, and to the people who let her know that she could shape the outcome of that battle.

Her mid had not been on any one person, but the constant presence of amused russet-colored eyes and the inquisitive look of her son was enough to push Natsuki forward once again.

And then there was Nao.

Natsuki tried not to think about her.

Somehow, the redhead's life had become very precious to her, without Natsuki ever even knowing it. It was strange that it had happened at all - for Natsuki guarded her heart closer to herself than most and Nao had never had a place in it to begin with.

The only thought in her head was that it couldn't be real. Whatever she thought about Nao was inconsequential, frivolous feelings that she had no place having. She had a responsibility to Shizuru, to Jun, to not get confused over simple actions. She had her reputation and honor to maintain.

This was just another obstacle put in place to test her love and dedication to Shizuru.

_Yes, that's what it had to be._

It was a slow day at the restaurant, halfway in between the lunchtime rush and the dinnertime push. Tate (formally Tokiha, and no, she quite content to have her husband's last name, thank you very much) Mai was leaning against the bar, deeply engaged in a conversation with her sous chef when the door banged open. While customers were not unheard of at three o'clock in the afternoon, most of them were regulars and knew better than to come in the ornate main entrance.

Mai looked up to see a very dirty and harassed looking Natsuki stalking through the empty tables towards her. She looked as though she'd been through the blender, and Mai was not really sure she wanted to know just how that particular state of being had come to pass.

Natsuki was not the sort to come running to her unless the situation dictated that both of Natsuki's usual shoulders to cry on were out of the question.

_Oh god._

"Mai." Natsuki said evenly, squaring herself to look professional and collected even with several nasty scrapes covering her arms and legs and covered in grime. "Could I speak to you alone?"

Mai glanced towards her sous chef, but he was already making his way back into the kitchen. Mai's staff knew that her circle of friends from outside the restaurant business were a tightly knit group with their own ideas about privacy and the like.

"What's going on?" Mai demanded. She looked Natsuki up and down. "You look like you've had a nasty fight."

Natsuki nodded, "Nao and I. It was an orphan, as far as I could tell." She looked very uncomfortable, standing in the middle of this large room. Mai remembered that feeling, the fear of open places that left her open to attack.

This was why she wanted nothing to do with whatever was starting to happen once more. She didn't want her family caught up in the same emotional battlefield that she'd been stuck in for most of her high school career.

"Do you want to go into my office?" Mai offered her smile as genuine as she could make it. She knew that it looked forced, but it seemed to be enough for Natsuki.

"That'd be nice." Natsuki responded.

They went through the kitchen and up a rickety set of stairs to the small hole-in-the wall office that was not connected to the apartment over the restaurant; Mai had carved it out for herself when she'd first started up the restaurant.

She sat down behind her cluttered desk and motioned for Natsuki to sit on the chair opposite.

"Orphans you said?" She had to get Natsuki talking again, for her instincts told her that there was more to this than Natsuki was letting on.

"Yeah." Natsuki sat down. "Nao managed to wound it, but she got cornered just as it was powering up for this sort of energy-based attack."

Natsuki looked down at her hands; they were clenched into tight fists. Mai wondered what could have been so horrid that Natsuki would be so hesitant to tell the story. "Is Nao alright?" Mai inquired.

_That_ would have been a disaster that Mai was not sure she wanted to oversee. Natsuki and Nao were close friends, even if no one else of their little band of HiME could understand where the friendship came from. They were alike souls, both so damaged by the hurt that the ones they loved had caused them - and yet so strong because of it.

They were happy now, Mai knew that.

She also knew how Nao would sometimes look at Kuga when she thought no one was watching.

Mai was no an idiot. She'd missed Fujino's lingering stares, but Nao was far more obvious about her interest. While Natsuki could not understand why Fujino was so intent on keeping the two friends apart - Mai could easily see where she would be worried. Nao wanted something more from Natsuki than the older woman was willing to give.

"She's fine. A little shaken." Natsuki shrugged, "I left her to deal with the authorities." She laughed a little jadedly, "If they are the real authorities at all. I wouldn't be surprised if First District of Searrs was behind this attack."

Mai nodded, they had been biding their time, waiting for the attacks to begin again. They would have to be more vigilant now.

"Why are you so shaken up then, Natsuki?" Mai asked. "You'd go running to Fujino if this was something that she could fix - and yet you come to me."

Mai hoped that she wouldn't have to remind Natsuki that the last time she'd turned to Mai for advice, it was because Fujino Shizuru had just murdered god only knew how many people in Natsuki's name. Those were old memories that Mai would not dredge up unless she absolutely had to.

She still had some honor about her.

"When Nao was cornered by that thing." Natsuki began, staring at her hands. They were flexing instinctively, in that way that they'd been doing ever since the HiME had started to regain their powers. Natsuki could not summon her guns, and it was the source of much debate between Mikoto and Mai herself as to why she couldn't do it. "I wasn't thinking of anything, just that I had to get her out of there. I just stood there and suddenly... suddenly."

Natsuki looked at Mai with pleading eyes, as if begging her friend to understand what was happening.

The pieces fell into place and Mai felt the blood drain from her face.

"Can you summon them again?" She asked, steering the conversation into safer waters. She didn't want to have to be the one to inform Natsuki of the long-standing affection that one Yuuki Nao held for her.

Natsuki closed her eyes and appeared to concentrate. As if they'd never left her hands, the small pistols fell into place.

"Last night," Natsuki said, staring at the weapons in her hands, "Last night Shizuru and I had a fight. About Nao. How typical of us." She shook her head, smiling sadly, "I told her that even if Nao had tried to kill me fifteen years ago, she'd actually succeeded in doing just that."

Mai blinked, "I had no idea that it was that bad."

"I wasn't thinking." Natsuki said angrily. "Feeling sorry for myself, and feeling worthless because I couldn't protect what was most important to me."

Mai nodded, that was the cause of a lot of Natsuki and Fujino's fights; if Nao's gossip was to be believed.

Natsuki continued; "And then Nao, fucking Nao, goes and gets herself in a tight spot and these stupid things come out without hesitation." She tossed her guns at the wall and they vanished into nothingness without so much as a sound.

Pained green eyes fixed Mai with a pleading gaze, "What do I do?"

For all her wisdom, Mai had no answer.


	12. Chapter 12

**Passages, Chapter Twelve**

_AN - This is the most feedback I've ever gotten on a chapter, I guess that I'm doing something right. I'm very impressed with your ability at trying to figure out what I'm doing. It's a fun game, is it not? So anyway, I haven't replied to anyone in a while, save for one person in a PM, so let's see._

_Glowie - Thank you for your continued words of praise, I'm glad that you understand and get why Nao is awesome as much as I do._

_Sumiregawa Nenene (god, it's been forever and three fandoms since I typed out that name) - I'm sorry that you're on pins and needles, or maybe I'm not. Isn't htat what a writer aims to do?_

_And everyone else: Yes, I put Natsuki in an awkward position, but it's just setting the stage right now for later events._

* * *

_First District has fallen completely off the boat since the former director of the _ _Fuuka_ _Academy__ and Nagi vanished off of the face of the earth. I try not to think about it, because Shizuru tends to get mad at me - and there are only so many lectures about dwelling in the past I can take before I find myself with a splitting headache. _

_I haven't been sleeping much lately, with our final exams coming up and the constant threat of saying the wrong thing and accidentally setting events in motion that I cannot reverse. _

_Still, I find myself lying awake at night pondering what happened to First District. So many of their agents died that night, and as much as I don't like to admit it – I feel bad for them. The great 'reset' that we were granted was by the grace of Mai – she could have wished for anything and she wished for the HiME's happiness. _

_She's a good soul, Mai. _

_We've fallen out of touch with the constant stress of my still being in university and she making her first foray out into the world of business and food. She's doing so well for herself that I almost hate to hang around her; for fear that I will somehow bring her down from the high plateau that she's found herself on. _

_We're still just poor students; we have nothing to offer her that she doesn't already have. _

_Yet it is our friendship that she craves. _

_Mai's always been like that. The rock when even your rock has stopped supporting you._

* * *

_Five Years Later. _

It was late when Natsuki returned home. She'd gotten caught up in the evening rush of the restaurant and Mai had put her to work mixing drinks in a way that she hadn't done since college. Natsuki didn't like to think back on those days when she'd spend her nights being an alluring sex object in a dingy bar to earn a little bit of extra cash, but even she could admit that she had some talent for tending the bar. She was quick and efficient then and the skills of bartending came back easily to her, as knowing how to make the three most commonly ordered drinks and how to fake the rest of them was all the skills that she really needed to succeed in that field.

Still, she felt a little guilty, as she could not shake the image of Nao, standing amid the blood and gore of the slain orphan telling her to leave. There was an undercurrent of tension in that scene and Natsuki was not sure why. She and Nao had been friends and playful rivals for so long that it almost seemed as though the recent attacks had driven some sort of a wedge between them. She'd left because that was what a decent person would have done; perhaps, however, Nao had really wanted her to stay.

No one, Natsuki reasoned, needed to see Nao at her weakest, and while Natsuki would have liked to comfort the girl, it was clear that comfort was not something that Nao needed right now. She needed something that Natsuki was fairly sure that not even she possessed.

Just as Natsuki managed to push all thoughts of Nao out of her head, she found herself plagued by another failure. The sad eyes of Shizuru plagued her vision as she tried not to think about the fact that she was not going home, where she should be. She didn't particularly feel like mending fences at the moment, and if she had to go home to another fight, she just as soon not go at all.

_That's no way to be thinking_, her mind chided her.

The sentiment, however, was true.

Natsuki had very little fight left in her after all of these years, and she didn't want to waste it on the trivial matters.

Theirs were bigger fish to fry.

Natsuki had kept the news on in the bar, despite the protests of a football match being on that everyone would have rather been watching. She needed to know if there had been any more attacks, if the orphans were going after the HiME or anyone they could get their grimy claws on.

So far, it appeared that the latter was the case. There were two attacks being reported, both with causalities. Natsuki knew what she had to tell Shizuru about the day's events, and just how much to leave out.

She wanted forgiveness, but Natsuki was far better suited towards a simple evasion of the truth.

The two of them were alike in that way.

Their kitchen was cool and dark as Natsuki made her way through it, her eyes not yet accustomed to the dim light.

She jabbed the answering machine and listened to three rather annoyed messages from her boss demanding to know where she was, and a slightly less-annoyed sounding one from Nao saying that she'd managed to get out of there before the authorities showed up.

Natsuki sighed, and flipped open her cell phone, Shizuru had called her four times over the course of the evening and Natsuki couldn't quite bring herself to leave the simple routine of working with Mai to call her back.

She needed the normalcy of that routine to put her head back in order. She'd just been attacked, violently, and she had to figure out how she was going to deal with it.

"Natsuki?" Natsuki snapped her phone closed and turned around. Shizuru stood in the doorway, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders.

Suddenly, Natsuki could not remember why she was trying so hard to avoid this confrontation. All she wanted to do was be in Shizuru's arms, to have her calm reassurance that everything would be alright.

Still, she restrained the impulse. It would be far too easy to just go on as though nothing would happen, and then the betrayal in Shizuru's eyes would be all the stronger when she found out the truth.

Best to stand and get it over with.

She clenched her hand around her cell phone and tried not to meet Shizuru's eyes, "There were attacks tonight. Orphans." She explained. The weight of this information was pressing down upon her and she couldn't help but continue, "They've killed three civilians that we know about. Nao and I managed to kill the one that attacked us, but there were others."

Shizuru was silent, as if thinking of how best to respond to this pronouncement, "You were attacked? Are you all right?"

Natsuki looked down at her hands, her mind once again on her guns and the ultimate betrayal that rested within them. She could just tell Shizuru, tell her that she didn't know who she was thinking of when she summoned them. It could have been Jun, or her, or Nao. Maybe even Mai.

There were just too many variables in that equation, however, and Natsuki did not want to risk anyone that she didn't have to.

"I'm fine." Natsuki smiled, "I lost my gun, but I'm fine."

"And Yuuki?" Shizuru asked her tone slightly icier.

Natsuki shrugged, she was treading into dangerous waters now and she knew that the chances of her getting away with hiding the truth were slim, if not non existent.

"She was fine, last I checked." Natsuki jerked her thumb towards the answering machine and phone. "She called about an hour ago to say that she'd gotten out of there unharmed." It figured that Shizuru would not answer the phone for Nao, even if she Nao was calling from a cell phone or a public phone.

Shizuru had a sort of sixth sense for knowing when Nao was calling.

Natsuki wondered if she was just being vindictive.

Shizuru wrapped her arms around herself, tugging the blanket more closely to her suddenly very thin form. Natsuki wondered when that change had taken place, for Shizuru looked sick - like she'd been ill for a long time and was only just now getting over it.

Natsuki's fingers were flexing as though she herself knew what it was that she had to do even before her mind had finally made the connection to what she was doing. The cool form of her element fell filled the void in her hands and heart almost before she realized what she was doing.

"The reason," She began, staring down at the guns in her hands, "The reason I couldn't come home was because I didn't know how I'd managed to summon these."

Shizuru's eyes widened - a sharp flash of light against the darkness. Natsuki knew that sign well, and she mentally readied herself for what was to come. She'd done this before; and she could do it again.

She'd do it, but she knew that she did not have the plan for what would happen to Jun should that happen.

Natsuki took a shaky breath and continued, "I was thinking of so many people when I summoned them. You, Jun, Mai; I don't know what happened."

She didn't know why she felt guilty, but she looked up and stared hard into Shizuru's eyes, willing her to understand. She was keeping Nao out of this conversation as carefully as she could - for the redhead was a sure-fire trigger for exactly what Natsuki didn't want to happen.

"Do you forgive me?" Natsuki asked.

Shizuru laughed. It was a hallow sound that echoed around the kitchen, filling, and at the same time creating a void of sound. There was no middle ground - they were into the dangerous waters.

"Natsuki's heart is big enough to hold more than just me? Why would that hurt me?" Shizuru smiled, and Natsuki stared hard into her gaze. There was hurt there, but something else as well, a shining admiration that Natsuki had never seen before. She realized that it must be impossible for Shizuru to make room in her heart for anyone but Natsuki. "It means that you are all the better sort of person for me to love, Natsuki."

She'd crossed the room in a second. There was no longer any need for words, for they were long past expressing their love that way. Still, Natsuki paused before Shizuru could take the lead and remove her ability to speak all together.

It was in times like this that Natsuki could not help but be honest. She hated herself for it, for being blunt was never the best way to get something done. "Nao was there, I was trying to save Nao when I did it."

Shizuru didn't say anything.

Natsuki took that to be a good sign. She took a deep breath, "What does that mean, Shizuru? What does it mean when I can't even fucking tell who I care for any more?"

Shizuru bent her head down and kissed where Natsuki's jaw line met her neck, just below the ear, "I'm sure that you were just acting in desperation, Natsuki."

Natsuki shuddered, and she wasn't sure if it was because of what Shizuru was doing, or rather, what she wasn't.

* * *

By the following morning, the news had reached the papers. Nao had actually made an effort to wake up that morning and collect the early editions before she made her way to Mai's for breakfast. She usually didn't go out, but since she'd missed her chance for a free meal from Natsuki the day before, she was more than content to mooch off of Mai's good cooking and hospitality.

_Yes,_ Nao thought with grim satisfaction. _I am just like Natsuki. I run to Mai when I don't know what to do. _

Mai was usually the person to go to, but as Nao cracked the newspapers open and read the details of three grisly murders that the HiME could have prevented, she realized that this was going beyond them. There was no way that any of them could control these attacks.

They had to find someone, anyone, with some connection to First District. If they could alert the organization, however evil it was, to the fact that people were being picked off the streets by the orphans, then perhaps the HiME would find themselves with some back-up.

Nao was pretty sure that First District was not behind the attacks. She remembered how they'd attacked in her youth, with careful precision and not enough mayhem to catch the attention of the media the way that these new attacks were.

No, something else was behind the attacks, something that didn't care if it got noticed.

It was the fear of being caught that terrified Nao the most. She was one of the few people who had the ability to actually to fight and kill these creatures with relatively little effort. She didn't want to become some sort of pet project for the military.

She'd leave that for Kuga, who had been doomed to that fate ever since her mother tried to sell her to Searrs.

Nao smiled ruefully, _Natsuki really should be more careful what she says._.

People talked to Nao, she was the sort of person who knew what buttons to push, and although she would never openly admit it, Nao liked it when people told her things. She was no gossip queen, but the information was carefully guarded until she had a chance to use it.

Still. Nao had secrets of her own and she knew better than to let them out into the open. she needed to talk to someone, anyone about what was happening to her. She knew what would happen if she died. She knew that she was the link to take out three HiME easily.

She couldn't think that way.

She folded the newspaper back up and glared at the salary man who was trying to get a chance to look up her skirt.

Something would never change, no matter how old you were.

Nao still couldn't stand men like that, but she'd come to accept the fact that it was perhaps better for her to stop beating them up on every opportunity. It did very little for her anger, and it was far easier to just break their hearts.

_Cold hearted bitch_, the song went. Nao understood entirely.

Yet she knew she had to keep her honor about her, she had to be sure that she wasn't going to be the weak link. Fujino could come to her, if there was anything that Kuga said to link her to what had happened that night, and Nao was pretty sure that she could put the woman in her place before things got out of hand.

It was just a matter of not letting Suzushiro know anything, ever.

The blond was the trigger that had set Fujino off last time, and with Yukino's rather meek personality, it was likely that they would have to continue dealing with the both of them when it came to HiME business.

What a mess that was.

Nao did not have a death wish, and as she exited the train she gave the man who'd been trying to look up her skirt a sweet smile. What was written into people genetic code could not be helped.

_Some people are just dumb. Others are terrifying._


	13. Chapter 13

**Passages, Chapter Thirteen**

_AN - So the last chapter was a bit slow, it was important to the plot. We can't go into a conflict without all the cards being on the table, it simply wouldn't be right. _

* * *

_I'm worried about Nao. I know that I shouldn't but she parties too hard for my liking and she doesn't even bother to do her school work most of the time, let alone come home at night. Not that she really has to worry about doing it. First District seems to have taken care of our grades when we do poorly as well as the rest of our lives._

_Bastards._

_Still, I worry about Nao. She'd been gone for long hours of the day and night, coming back to crash on our couch when she doesn't want to go all the way back to the dorms. _

_I feel as though when she discovered sex, she suddenly did become the creature that she used to be, back before the carnival began in earnest. I know that she can hold her own in a fight; but the thought of her out on the streets bothers me for some reason. I know that I shouldn't care, that Nao can take care of herself. Yet I worry._

_Its strange to see her early in the morning, passed out on the couch, drooling and generally ruining the picture of 'sex kitten' that she works so hard to portray. I don't know how Shizuru manages to keep her cool with Nao dropping by all the time. She takes it silently, as Shizuru does most things; but I can see her stare at Nao with the air of contempt that she usually reserves for Suzushiro Haruka._

_I know that their relationship has been strained, to say the least, from the beginning; but Shizuru's usually much better at hiding her emotions. I don't know where her parents got off, telling her to keep everything bottled up, like she's some sort of super samurai. _

_Even samurai have the right to get angry._

_It's just, you know, out of character for them. _

_Still, she manages, but she's also starting to be a bit more concerned for Nao's welfare, but it's really only a passing sort of interest. I try to care more than that, because I understand what Nao's going through. She's older, and a lot smarter than most of her classmates. Not to mention the fact that she's seen a lot more of this world and beyond than anyone her age should have had to see._

_This morning I found some pills under one of the couch cushions, pills that neither Shizuru nor I remember ever having. I asked Nao about them, telling her that if we ever wanted to have a foster child, there was no way that we could have pills just randomly lying around. _

_Nao said they were for the chronic headaches she sometimes got when she studied too much._

_I doubted that._

_I didn't know what to say to her, so I just let her go. I threw the pills away. _

_I guess that I didn't want to accept that Nao might be getting in a little over her head. She'd been very good at acting mature above her years all her life and I didn't think that it would change now._

_I know that Nao has issues with her mother, and that she does occasionally run into her from time to time, as living in the city will do that to you. Still, the woman threw Nao out on the curb when she was fourteen, saying that she was no child of her's. _

_I wonder if I've been something of a surrogate mother for her ever since. _

_Shizuru can't understand why I want to help her, but it goes deeper than that._

_Nao's set of awful circumstances just happened years after mine, but they are the same._

_Parent alive, but wants nothing to do with you._

_I guess that I'm just glad that Shizuru's parents like me enough to not really question our relationship that much._

_I need to talk to Nao, to find out what's wrong._

* * *

_Five years later._

"We have to refocus our efforts." Natsuki surveyed the room, coldly looking at the small band of women she'd begun to think of as her troops. They were fighting a silent, nightly war against some unspeakable evil that they could not understand. They had no information and they were running, very quickly out of ideas.

_It's like fucking Sailor Moon. _ Natsuki thought bitterly, the one thing that she'd wanted to avoid was happening to her and she had no idea how to stop it. She remembered when she'd first discovered her powers how she had tried to reason them away in her head. She'd know that she had to do her duty and be a HiME if she ever wanted to get revenge on the people who'd killed her mother – yet she remembered the anime from her childhood.

This was all too much like that for her liking.

_I've become a magical girl._

Gods above, she even had all the hallmarks of being one. Magical powers, one true love, conflicted feelings about her friends, a giant mech dog that did everything she asked him to. Natsuki shook her head.

_No, scratch that, Duran was a wolf._

_Midori must be loving this._

"What I mean to say is that we have to find a way to get some miss-information to the police - to get them off of our trail. You all know as well as I do that we've had several near-misses with the authorities. We can't undercut them in their investigation; but we need someone to feed them some information to get them out of our target area so that we can stage a confrontation."

The room was silent. Their plan had been to ambush one of the many orphans that had been attacking the city and then let it loose once more. They knew that if it did not find what it was looking for, or if it encountered resistance that it could not overcome it would most likely report back to whoever was setting them on the city in the first place. That was what had happened with the Searrs orphans, before the carnival had started – and that was what was most likely to happen again.

They couldn't function as a team, however. They were so accustomed to fighting against each other that working together was a little bizarre. They stepped on each other's toes, but still, everyone had accepted Natsuki's easy assumption of the leadership position when it seemed that Mai, the strongest (supposed) fighter among them, and Midori, their scholar (and all-around _nerd_ for this sort of stuff) had both turned down the position.

_So I'm fucking Sailor Moon._

Nao looked up from her nail file and narrowed her eyes as Natsuki's gaze met her's. They were trying to avoid each other as best as they possibly could - yet Natsuki was the only one in the room that was privy to Nao's mother's choice of employment.

After the woman had woken up and washed her hands of Nao, she'd gone to work as a secretary for a private investigator in the very city that Nao would later herself settle in. As far as Natsuki knew, they had no contact with each other save for the occasional accidental run-in.

Natsuki wondered what it would be like to have a parent, and yet not have a relationship with them. She'd always tried her absolute best to be accepted by her friends' families, taking them on as her own.

Her father, even after all these years, could not be bothered to send her a card at the New Year. He dictated it through his secretary and she always copied it to herself.

Natsuki supposed it was her own fault, for being so obsessed with her plots for revenge on First District in the first place. She'd never bothered to build a relationship with the man, and because of that, she had nothing to say for it. She'd seen him a grand total of two times since she finished high school. Once was her undergraduate graduation ceremony – where he'd missed a large portion of the ceremony and had caused a big scene; and the other was a formal signing of some legal documents that Natsuki's name was somehow in, so her presence was required.

Sure, her father had stuck her in boarding school, but it had not been a bad existence. She'd been happy, when she wasn't worrying about the fact that she was doomed to forever be remembered as 'that so-and-so's' daughter who would never amount to anything – or HiME business, whichever was more pressing at the time.

"Nao," Natsuki said, the name still sounding shaky on her tongue. She was being too careful; one of them was bound to notice something.

That was if Akane would actually pay attention and stop messaging Kazuya on her phone.

"Nao do you think you could get in touch with some people who could throw them off of the scent?" Natsuki knew what she was asking for, and what Nao would rather do than comply.

Jumping off a bridge was among those things, if Natsuki remembered correctly.

"Don't you think that Yukino should be the one asking around?" Natsuki closed her eyes and mentally counted to ten. She had never been on very good terms with

Suzushiro Haruka, not even after Yukino and Shizuru had apparently mended fences. The woman did not know how to keep her mouth closed. "She certainly knows more people than Yuuki."

_Funny, she might have well have said, 'that delinquent' rather than 'Yuuki'._

"I was asking Nao to contact one person in particular." Natsuki said though clenched teeth, "I just was avoiding this particular conversation, for privacy's sake." Natsuki said the word 'privacy' in English as Nao had done for much of their childhood, to give it emphasis and to make it clear that there was no room for negotiation around it.

Haruka looked crestfallen for a moment, but then returned to silently fuming. Natsuki was glad that she was just keeping her mouth shut. That woman had a way with words that surprised even Natsuki - for no matter what came out of her mouth, the consequences were usually bad for someone.

She didn't want to force Nao to explain the situation.

They were walking on pins and needles as it was.

"Whom did you want her to contact, Natsuki?" Shizuru asked with the air of mild curiosity. Natsuki hear something under that curious tone, and it scared her. Shizuru hadn't exactly been pushing Natsuki for information about Nao in the past few days, but there was a genuine interest that went above and beyond the cool dislike that had characterized Shizuru's feelings towards Nao for the last fifteen years.

Nao turned her attention to towards Shizuru, and the temperature in the room seemed to drop significantly. While nothing appeared wrong on the surface, Natsuki knew that this was a silent war of contrition between two incredibly strong wills.

"In my line of work, you make connections with all manners of life," Nao said airily, returning to filing her nails and filling the room once more with awkward silence. "Some are far less desirable than others."

"I still don't understand-" Suzushiro piped up again, only to have the entire room glare at her once more.

"Haruka, we all have public faces, to some extent. We need someone who can be seen as anonymous - which is something that you or I cannot do." Yukino explained, taking off her glasses and rubbing her eyes tiredly.

They were all running on next-to-no sleep, for they had to keep up appearances at work, on top of the fact that they were up to all hours of the night watching over the city as best they could.

They'd managed, at least, to prevent any more deaths.

There was a hiccupping cry of a young child from somewhere towards the back of the room and Mai was off her chair in a second, hurrying towards the back, "I swear, he can't keep her happy to save his life."

Yukariko smiled knowingly, and Natsuki understood, for perhaps the first time, why she did. "Some girls just need their mothers."

Nao shrugged, "And then again some don't."

Suzushiro made a move to say something, but Natsuki fixed her with the best glare she could manage. "We keep you here," She began, "for the soul reason that you were _far_ too involved in the last carnival to not be involved in whatever this one brings."

"Yeah, her big mouth was; and we don't really need that again." Nao snorted. "Caused more problems than any one of us combined."

"I do remember a certain rampage," Natsuki shot back, "That had everything to do with your left eye and nothing to do with her."

Why was she defending Suzushiro? She'd been there, and had heard the words that had caused the deaths of so many members of First District. Why they were not innocent, per say, they certainly did not deserve to be put down the way that they were.

Shizuru smiled appreciatively at Natsuki, but Natsuki knew that there was a strong undercurrent of guilt filling the room that left no space for negotiation.

No one said anything. Nao spoke the truth and they had no way to avoid it.

Natsuki ran a hand tiredly through her hair. "How the fuck are we supposed to work together if we can't even be nice to each other?"

* * *

"Yuuki, could I talk to you for a moment?" The question flowed off her lips easily, far too easily for the implications of what she was asking. This conversation could go sour quickly, far too quickly for her own liking. She had to play it right and keep her cool. She didn't want to open herself up to one of Yuuki's well-placed verbal attacks.

The redhead looked up for the scrutiny she was giving her fingernails and smiled wickedly, as if she already knew what this was about. There was a flicker of something that Shizuru had never seen before, behind her eyes.

It smelled a bit like fear.

_Perfect._

"What do you want?" She was never really the polite sort of person, Shizuru had resigned herself to that fact a long time ago.

"What happened that night?" She was being forceful, and that was what she wanted. If she was still able to capitalize on the residual fear that Yuuki had for her, there was a chance that she could get the truth out of the younger woman without so much as exerting an effort.

Shizuru really did not want to beat the confession out of the girl.

They were alone in the room; everyone else had filtered out and down the stairs - to the promise of some leftovers from a very good restaurant well out of any of their normal price ranges.

"Do you want me to tell you what your _precious_ Natsuki did?" Yuuki demanded, angry green eyes flashing, "She didn't do anything. She fought to protect the people in this city just as much as the rest of us."

Shizuru's tone dropped, quiet and threatening. "You know that that's not what I'm asking you."

"Oh, I know, Fujino." Yuuki laughed, "But it wasn't to rescue you that your precious _lover_ summoned her guns."

Did that girl know what she was doing? Shizuru's thoughts raced as she tried to maintain her already failing grip on her sanity. "Watch your words."

"Oh, Fujino. I watch them closely. I know what they do." Yuuki giggled, and pushed away from her place by the wall. "I'll leave you with that."

She paused by the door, "Perhaps_ Na-tsu-ki_ loves someone else more than you?"

Shizuru's fists were clenched so tightly that she could feel her nails cutting into her skin.

_That bitch. This was what she wanted all along._

Submit Review Report Possible Abuse Add Story to Favorites Add Story to Story Alert Add Author to Favorites Add Author to Author Alert Add Story to C2 Archive


	14. Chapter 14

**Passages, Chapter Fourteen  
**

_AN - Hey, I was wondering if anyone would like to function as an e-mail beta for me. Just because I've gotten a few comments about silly little mistakes that I've made. Personally, I'm just thankful that I haven't messed up the continuity yet. I need someone who'd be willing to yell at me and tell me that I'm being stupid and ask me to elaborate on some parts. _

_Just send me a PM if you're interested. _

* * *

_Conflict has this inevitable way of sneaking up on me. My life has been plagued by it, in one way or another, since the day I was born and marked as a HiME. I try to avoid it, but I tend to attract drama like a moth to a flame. _

_Shizuru says that it's just my want for something important in my life, something to care about more than just my own miserable existence. I've told her stories about how, for much of my childhood, I denied myself the simple comforts of a normal life. There was no love, teddy bears and grade school crushes for Kuga Natsuki. No, I was too focused on getting revenge on the people who'd taken my mother from me, too focused on hating my father to notice how the world functioned around me. _

_So I get drawn into the drama. I like it. People don't talk to me like they talk to Mai or maybe even Sister (even though I should not call her that, the name has stuck) Yukariko. Still, I hear things, and I try to make sense of them all on my own. _

_People come to me because I have the appearance of being impartial. _

_I like that feeling; it makes it so that I am never forced to take a side that I do not want to._

* * *

_Five years later. _

Natsuki did not like to find herself in the middle of impossible situations. Yet impossible situations like to shove her smack dab in the middle of them whenever the opportunity arrived. Whether she was expected to somehow manage to ace her high school entrance exams after being up for three days straight infiltrating a hospital that they'd suspected was a front for a First District research lab, or simply saying the right thing to Shizuru after there carnival; Kuga Natsuki was one of the sort of people to whom terrible situations were like second nature to.

What was worse about this one was that the had known this was going to happen since the event that had triggered this event had happened three days before - yet now, as she was faced with having to deal with the potential fall out and long pent-up issues of the two persons in question.

Natsuki wanted to remain impartial. That was the skill that had gotten her so far in the business world, up and above that glass ceiling that she'd been told stories about her entire childhood.

And yet she could not.

Nao had pushed her into a situation that she could not even being to try and talk her way out of. They were at an impasse - and Nao wanted them there.

Natsuki was not sure for what reason, just yet.

Still, she was no fool. When Nao had walked down the stairs with that self-satisfied smile on her face, Natsuki knew that damage had been done. She just was not sure what Nao had said, but the feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach was growing.

Nao would have said something, most likely insinuating that Natsuki loved someone more that Shizuru herself - that the reason her guns had come out, _Natsuki's own dread_, was because of her, and not Shizuru.

Natsuki did not know if Shizuru could come back from something like that. She'd always thought that Shizuru was one of the most sane people she'd known, before the carnival, but the events of that fateful night would never leave Natsuki's mind. She had to tread carefully around certain issues, for she did not want to lose Shizuru to an onslaught of memories and insanity that she would never be able to recover from.

Still, this time, it was not outright rejection - like what Suzushiro pushed Natsuki into doing during the carnival – and therefore they might have a chance to nip this little psychotic break in the bud. Still, the thought, the slightest notion really, that Natsuki would betray Shizuru like that was close enough to potential trigger a similar reaction.

Natsuki hoped that that wasn't the case.

"Mai," Natsuki said urgently, pulling the red-head into a corner of the room. She had to do this privately, for she knew what she was asking. Mai went willingly, for all her privately closed looks. Natsuki was grateful that Mai had the discretion to simply follow when Natsuki chose to lead.

Not many people did.

"Natsuki - what?" Mai began, but followed Natsuki's continued glare in Nao's direction. She looked from Natsuki to Nao and back again, realization dawning on her face as she did so. "Oh, don't tell me."

Natsuki shrugged; the gesture long and exaggerated. She had no doubt, really, but she knew that Mai, of all people, would look towards the good in a person. Natsuki liked Nao well enough, perhaps enough to call her one of her few close friends - but she was still the first to admit that Nao worked purely for her own motives.

Still, Natsuki wondered if there wasn't perhaps some greater reason why she was potentially goading Shizuru into another mental break.

"I need you to be willing to take care of Jun for a few days." Natsuki said in quick, terse tones. She had to be ready, and Jun had a special connection to Mai for some reason. He was the only one of the HiME (other than Mikoto, who Natsuki would not trust to keep a plant alive) that her son had ever really interacted with - and he functioned as an older brother figure for Arisa. It would be a good match, should things turn sour.

"You're not..." Mai trailed off. She knew better than to doubt the tone in Natsuki's voice. She'd only heard it once before.

Natsuki had been willing to die that time too.

"If I must, I will act as I did then." Natsuki said, placing a hand on Mai's shoulder. "I don't think it will come to that, but I need to be prepared. We have more to think about this time, more responsibilities."

Mai nodded, "So much more on the line."

"I'm going to do damage control." Natsuki muttered through clenched teeth. She did not want to have this confrontation with Nao and the one with Shizuru would be painful, to say the least.

Nao needed to know her place. It was not to play the instigator the many ups and downs of Shizuru and Natsuki's relationship.

She was part of the problem if she wasn't part of the solution, and would be dealt with accordingly.

Natsuki just hoped it wouldn't fall to her to take care of Nao.

_That would be hard. _

Natsuki climbed the stairs back up into Mai's office with a heavy heart. At the door, she paused, her hand resting on the handle. The cool metal was calming her, the icy feeling of the dread in her stomach surging forward.

She felt like she had to vomit - anything to pull her away from this.

Nao was not going to get off easy, Natsuki thought bitterly, pushing the door open, "Shizuru?" She called, peering into the room.

Shizuru was still sitting where she'd been sitting when Natsuki had followed Mai downstairs to help with Arisa and getting the food ready. Natsuki crossed the room in three steps.

"Shizuru?" She asked, laying a hand on her lover's shoulder.

Shizuru started as though she had not noticed that Natsuki had come into the room. Natsuki could see the whites of her knuckles and four perfect crescent-shaped cuts in the palm of her hand.

Nao had said something then.

"Are you alright?" Natsuki asked, hooking a chair with her foot and dragging it to rest just behind her knees. She sat and pulled Shizuru's hand into her lap, inspecting it.

"_Natsuki_," Shizuru muttered, looking lost. Natsuki had never seen her like this, and it scared her.

Suddenly, Shizuru's composure came back. She shook her head, "I'm fine, Natsuki." She said with a sickly pleasant tone. Natsuki felt her skin crawl as Shizuru spoke.

The tone was fake, the allusion was fake.

They had to get out of here.

"I don't think you are." Natsuki had never been one to be particularly direct in her approaches to dealing with Shizuru, especially when she was like this. It was better to simply go for the shock-value of whatever rabbit she was able to pull out of her hat at the last minute. The rabbit that would save them all. "I think you're letting your doubt take hold of you. You're letting it consume you like you did that time."

Shizuru looked up to Natsuki with sad eyes, "This goes far beyond doubt, Natsuki."

Natsuki nodded, "You don't need to doubt me." She had to reassure her love that there was nothing to fear, that they were doing something good - righteous. Theirs was a cause that was fit to win.

Shizuru looked hurt, like the very admission of her heart hurt her inside more than Natsuki could ever comprehend. "I don't know if I can not doubt you."

"Why?" Natsuki demanded. "Have I ever given you a reason, even a sliver of doubt?"

Shizuru was silent.

"I didn't think so." She was being vindictive, she knew that. But she was hurt that Shizuru would even thing that she would betray the mutual trust that they'd built up over the years. "So why?"

Shizuru sighed, "She has a way with words."

Natsuki smiled, Nao did and Natsuki was the first to admit it, "So do you."

Shizuru nodded, "But I'm not mean, cruel like that."

"I will make her pay." Natsuki promised. She was the hero in this twisted fairy-tale after all. She was allowed to exact her revenge on whomever she pleased. She would to. Just to make sure that the message got across, loud and clear.

It occurred to her that Shizuru was still avoiding answering her questions. She didn't know how to pull the focus back to the matter at hand. She had promised something that she fully intended to fulfill.

Nao had to get it through her overly-thick skull that it was a bad idea to keep interfering with persons who could, and had killed her in the past.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Natsuki asked once more. She was pressing for information and Shizuru was once more stonewalling her.

They needed to move past this stage for their relationship.

Yet they'd been stuck there for almost fifteen years.

Shizuru would not meet Natsuki's eyes. "I'm fine." Her tone was such that Natsuki knew that there was no room for further conversation. It was this tone that Natsuki hated so much about Shizuru. This particular face that Natsuki did not know how to navigate around. She was powerless against it, and she hated it.

Shizuru knew just where to get her.

Natsuki pushed her chair away from Shizuru's and stood up, pulling the other woman with her. "I will fix this," She promised, "but I cannot do it without your help. You have to be strong for me, Shizuru. I can't bear to lose you, and Jun's finally starting to accept us as his real parents."

Shizuru's eyes still looked dead, but with the mention of Jun's name, there was a flicker of life that seemed to be rekindled within them. Natsuki pulled her in close and hugged her. "Shizuru. I love you so much, I couldn't stand losing you."

"I know."

"Don't fall prey to her traps." Natsuki said once more. There was nothing that she could do to stress the point more; it just had to be made. Theirs was a fragile balance and there was nothing that either of them could do to change that.

Natsuki held out her hand to Shizuru, an offering of peace and promise. "Come, there's still some food left."

Shizuru stared at Natsuki's hand for a moment, before taking it in her own. "I love you, Natsuki." She murmured, "Don't let anything that I do make you forget that fact."

Natsuki smiled, "Never." She agreed.

They had reached an accord, and it was all that they could do to keep it. Both of them were of the age at which such knots that were tied in youth often snapped, and yet theirs had remained strong and true, a testament to the love they had for one another.

There were things that grew between them, but they were little evils, necessary parts of life that came and went like the passing of the seasons.

_Perhaps_, Natsuki mused, _we can make it through this after all._

The group of friends and allies in the room below welcomed them back into the circle of conversation as though they'd never left. Natsuki kept her eyes on Shizuru, who was in turn watching Nao. The two of them were avoiding each other's eyes and every once in a while, Natsuki would see Nao shoot her what appeared to be an apologetic glance.

Natsuki would deal with her later.

Midori's cell phone beeped and she excused herself to answer it. The conversation kept on until she came back into the room, ashen faced.

"That was Himeno." She said, very quietly, not looking at them. Quiet had fallen so quickly that even her soft and uncertain words echoes like a gunshot across the room. "She's been in touch with First District and Searrs; neither of them is behind the attacks."

"Neither of them?" Nao shorted, "How about both of them together?"

"It could work." Akane agreed, smiling at Nao.

Natsuki wanted to break something.

She was standing in a room full of people who were trying to prevent a genocide, and their one clue had just turned out to be a dead end.

"This is so typical." Natsuki grumbled, pulling on her jacket and handing Shizuru's to her. "Just when you think you've got it all figured out."

"What are you going to do, Natsuki?" Shizuru asked, taking her coat, but not beginning to put it on.

Nice try, Shizuru. Natsuki thought. "We're going to go home, and then I'm going to try and get in touch with some of my old contacts."

She wasn't going to leave Shizuru and Nao alone without her. Not yet.

She was still too uncertain.

Shizuru smiled back at her, "Natsuki knows me so well." She said sweetly, in that same carefree tone that she'd used before.

Natsuki wanted to scream.


	15. Chapter 15

**Passages, Chapter Fifteen**

_AN - Special thanks to Sumiregawa-kun for the awesome beta and conversation. _

* * *

_I refuse to play into their hands, but sometimes they play their cards so well that I don't realize that is exactly what I'm doing. The corporate world is not for me, I can't handle the pressure at times. I took too much pressure at too young an age for me to continue to be the 'Ice Queen' now._

* * *

_Five Years Later _

Despite the fact that they were floundering and generally lacking information, Natsuki had kept an ace up her sleeve to play later. She wanted to make sure that the information offered was good first, however. This could be their big break.

Natsuki was sitting in her office, her sleeves rolled up past her elbows and her head resting on her hands. As she sat there, she was slowly realizing that she'd collected a number of nervous ticks over the years, like running her hands though her hair and tapping her pencil against the desk or her head, depending on what surface happened to be available.

She was going through a final proof of one of the chief staff engineer's calculations for carbon emissions from their latest project and so far she had found three errors in the simple math alone. She had not yet even gotten to the more complicated calculations yet.

She sighed and stretched. The nights of no sleep and the constant stress of worrying about Shizuru and Nao were starting to catch up to her. Natsuki didn't think that she could keep up the routine for much longer without a full night of sleep to recover. She'd been trying to think up a way to turn their nightly patrols into shifts so that they could all get more sleep, even if it meant sacrificing manpower.

Natsuki didn't think it was worth it, however. They needed to be at their best to take down an orphan alone, and since they were all working at less-than-full capacity, it seemed logical that they would want to protect themselves by working in groups.

A knock on her door pulled her out from her musings. "Come in," she called, not really caring what her secretary wanted now. The man was forever trying to get her to go along with something or another – and Natsuki was having none of it, today.

She personally thought that he might be attracted to her, as it was the only reason she could think of for his continued advances and constant, overly-friendly attitude.

_I suppose I deserve it for having a male secretary._ Natsuki mused, smiling tiredly at the man.

"Your two o'clock is here, Miss Kuga," he said, bowing slightly as was his custom. He was very polite in his mannerisms, even if he didn't make up for it with his words from time to time. They did not have the same sort of happy relationship that many bosses and secretaries had in this day and age. Sure, Natsuki saw the man every day, but it didn't make her any less happy to see him every morning.

"Ah," Natsuki said, "Give me a minute."

This meeting was a vitally important one, but not for the reasons that her secretary seemed to be thinking. He probably thought that she was having a meeting with the wealthy daughter of one of their larger shareholders to explain some potential growth in the company; but he could not be more wrong.

Natsuki marked where she was in the proof on her notes and carefully tucked her own calculations into the folder with her engineer's. She would have to talk with him later, for if his work continued to be this error-ridden, the company would have no choice but to ask him to leave. They could not stand for errors in their work, not if they wanted to keep their noses ahead of their American and European competition.

She cleared her desk of anything that would suggest that she actually worked in her office and stood. Her jacket was tossed onto the spare chair in the corner. Natsuki pulled it on and winced.

Her back was still bruised from last night.

Even though they were HiME and they recovered quickly, it seemed as though they were slowly losing the ability to heal as they once did. It was as though their powers were morphing into something else entirely and she wasn't sure that she liked it.

_Then again, it could just be old age._ Natsuki frowned, it was best not to be thinking such things right before an important meeting; it was demoralizing.

She took a deep breath and stepped out into the reception area. Her secretary was chattering away on the phone in an earnest tone that told Natsuki that he was actually doing work for once. He usually just gossiped with the other undersecretaries - as Natsuki was one of the few high-ranking members of the company working in this particular city.

She did not want to do this.

Before her stood a young woman that Natsuki had not seen since she graduated from Fuuka. While most of the HiME had tried to stay in touch, it was this girl - the one who had perhaps some of the best insight into what they were facing because of her upbringing - who might hold the answers.

"Miss Munakata," Natsuki said, bowing. She was very good at acting the part for her secretary, and he continued his work without so much as the usual glower he usually sent her when Nao showed up unannounced. He seemed to eat her politeness up, even though Natsuki did not feel that she had to be particularly polite. She hadn't really known the woman before her that well in school; just a passing face - the girl who'd been in love with Tate Yuuichi even though he was year too mature for her.

Natsuki had never had to fight her.

The woman stood as best she could, for traveling in full kimono was hard, and sitting in a hard backed chair even more difficult. "Kuga," she said shortly.

Natsuki wondered what had possessed her to wear a full Kimono into the city. She'd stick out like a sore thumb. A country bumpkin with no place in the city.

_Good god, she's going to get mugged. _

Natsuki had worn a kimono exactly four times in her life - and hadn't a clue how to wear one properly. She wondered how a little girl from the middle of nowhere had managed to turn into such an elegant-looking young woman.

_Good genes, most likely. _

Natsuki also wondered where it was, exactly, that she'd acquired the high-and-mighty attitude. She'd pulled her hair out of the traditional octopus style, but it did little to make her look older above her years.

Natsuki stepped backward and offered the door to her office. "Shall we talk in here?" There was no question in her tone, and she did not intend for there to be. She wanted this little girl to know that she was in charge here.

Even if it was that same little girl that held all the answers to their puzzle.

Munakata Shiho had a long history of not associating with the HiME, as her powers had been revealed so late in the game. They, too, hinged on her mental status and Natsuki was quite ready not to have another repeat of what had happened the last time Shiho'd felt betrayed.

Still, because she was raised at what was basically a shrine to Ikusahime, there was a chance that she would know something that would point them to whatever was sending the orphans out again.

Natsuki closed the door behind her with a meaningful glance at her secretary. She did not want to be disturbed. Crossing over to the low tea-table that Shizuru had insisted she set up in one corner, Natsuki offered Shiho a pillow and sank onto the one opposite her. She was glad to be wearing pants today, even if they would be wrinkled beyond restoration because of her current position.

Still, it was worth it.

"What do you know?" Natsuki asked. They had been trying to keep their circle as tightly contained as possible, and since the only other HiME that Shiho would have any cause to interact with would be Mai (and that seemed a lot less likely to happen since Arisa was born), Natsuki needed to make sure that Shiho knew all the facts before they continued.

"The attacks are beginning, like they did at school." Shiho began. She looked down for a moment, "But neither organization that was controlling them last time is behind it this time."

Natsuki inspected her nails. She must be in touch with Himeno, to know this much.

"Did it ever occur to you that they might just be shielding themselves from potential repercussions? I mean, last time they got hit really bad and none of them came back like we did." Shiho demanded.

_How did she know that? _Natsuki's thoughts quickly turned to the conversations of her youth. She'd never even had more than a ten minute conversation with this girl, how could she possibly know things that even some of the more active, and less powerful HiME did not.

Natsuki shrugged, "I don't think so." If it was First District's agenda to control them all once more, they were doing a piss-poor job of it. They knew all the tricks in the book to control people who were afraid and confused - like the teenage girls they expected to act out the legend of some ancient being who was so long forgotten than even the festival in its name was considered an just a folk tradition.

Natsuki didn't think that First District really understood how to control people who were already content with their loves.

It would be interesting to find out.

"Kuga, you do realize that I want nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with this." Shiho said, placing her hands on the table and glaring across at Natsuki. The anger at being called down to this unfamiliar city, closer to people and memories that she'd prefer to forget was clearly written across Shiho's face.

Natsuki supposed that she might be justified, if she had actually been a major player in the build up to the carnival; but instead she simply represented an aspect of their own high school drama that Natsuki would prefer to forget.

Right now, it just seemed to Natsuki as though Shiho was just trying to hide from a past that didn't particularly suit image she'd grown into: the cool and collected shrine maiden who wanted nothing do with the earthly troubles of her childhood acquaintances.

Natsuki calmly set her hands on the table as well. "You already are a part of this. You are one of twelve; you are a part of the whole."

Shiho shook her head. "You cannot make me do this."

Natsuki stood up and began to pace the room. She could not stand for this kind of reaction, not from any of the HiME. She needed Shiho for purely academic reasons, for she was useless in a fight.

The girl had no drive to battle with the rejection of the most important person in the world to her.

_He did knock another girl up, it was the least he could do to marry her. _

That was going to be a source of issues from within their little band if Natsuki did not nip it in the bud and simply remove the temptation for potential conflict. Shiho would not work with Mai, just Natsuki directly. And she would only provide a supplement to Midori's research. That was the best that Natsuki could do.

"Midori has a theory that what's happening is basically just a continuation of the Ikusahime legend," Natsuki said. "I don't want your opinion on anything other than that this: is there a possibility that this could be true?"

Shiho nodded jerkily. "The legend does not end with the great battle against the darkness"

"The second evil," Natsuki intoned quietly.

"Yes, a second, greater evil faced the maiden and she was forced to once more call upon her warriors to protect her and her people from the darkness."

"So there's so merit to the discussion?"

Shiho shrugged, "It happened thousands of years ago, and the carnival happens only once every one hundred years. There's no way to be sure if this is the same story or if these attacks are just further proof that some new organization - or maybe even one of the old ones - is trying to kill us once again."

Natsuki sighed, "No one is trying to kill us," She assured Shiho. She smiled the best smile that she could muster, but the gesture felt alien on her face; like she was simply hiding from the truth.

They _were_ trying to kill them, that much was certain.

"We're going to try and follow the Orphans back to their source, and then see who is controlling them," Natsuki explained. "You can go back to your life and we'll try not to bother you."

Shiho stood and bowed. "Thank you."

Natsuki didn't think she needed thanking. What she needed was reassurance that she wasn't doomed to be the one who was destined to die in this conflict once again. Shiho had stayed on until the end, and her will had been strong then. There was a chance, no matter how small, that she would once again become a problem.

Natsuki just prayed that she'd moved on from the events of the past. That she still wasn't attached to Tate the way she'd been in school.

Now, that would be a disaster.

* * *

Kikukawa Yukino was just getting off work when her cell phone rang. She was hesitant to pick it up, for it was most likely one of the interns calling for help on some project. Still, she knew that she had an obligation as their mentor to pick up the phone, even if she didn't think it a good idea.

"Hello?" She said, flipping open the cell and heading towards the train station. If she was lucky, the conversation would be over before she had to get on the train. She always felt awkward talking to someone on the train, like thousands of strangers could hear conversations.

"Yukino, its Nao." Well, that was an unexpected turn of events. Usually, Nao took advantage their friendship when she got into a tight spot, but that had not happened in ages, so Yukino had no idea why the redhead would be calling her. "Do you have a minute?"

Yukino sighed and looked at her watch. She wanted to go home and sleep, not talk to her delinquent friends about whatever was troubling them at the moment. "Yes." she said, allowing gallantry to win out. "What is it?"

"I think that Fujino's trying to kill me."

Yukino couldn't help it, she snorted loudly. It was strange for her to find herself suddenly in a position where she could laugh at someone, and Yukino wasn't sure that she liked it. Still, Nao had a habit of stating the obvious when she was in the mood to do so, and it seemed that she just wanted to be funny today. Yukino decided to play along. So what else was new? "Are you sure that you didn't do anything to deserve it?"

_At least it's not me or Haruka this time._ Yukino knew that it was a bad thought to be having, just as Nao was admitting her fears, but Fujino Shizuru terrified her. There was no way that Yukino was going to let even the thin bonds of her friendship with Nao come in the way of her staying _out_ of Fujino's line of fire.

No matter what their peace was, Yukino knew better than to step between Fujino and her target. She would be cut down, as Haruka and Diana had been before, without so much as a second thought.

_Nao can have her death wish. _

Nao laughed. "Oh, I definitely did." She paused for a minute, "But for a reason. It's always better to have one of those. I need them to forget that Kuga summoned her guns because I was in danger."

Yukino blinked. She hadn't known that; only that suddenly Kuga didn't have to deal the same problem that had plagued all of them.

She'd been uncertain, and now she knew what was important to her.

"I don't understand, Nao." Yukino had never really understood why Nao insisted on having a friendship with her. She understood that Nao craved the friendship of everyone in the HiME circle simply because she didn't have anyone else in the world. Still, as a friend and therefore a defacto voice of reason, it was her responsibility to inform Nao that she was insane. "You _taunted her _about her one weakness and expect everything to come out all right in the end. That's suicide." She paused for a breath, but then continued, "_If_ Fujino wants you dead, there's nothing you can say to her to prevent that. Even if you had reasons, as you put it."

Nao laughed again, this time a little bit more harshly. "Don't worry; I'm pretty good at avoiding situations like that."

She did practically live with the two of them for a while in college, Yukino reasoned. She should be okay.

Still, it was strange to think that Nao would just go and basically offer Fujino her head on a silver platter like that. Yukino shrugged. She'd talk to some of the others about it, perhaps there was more at work here than what met the eye.


	16. Chapter 16

**Passages, Chapter Sixteen**

_AN - Special thanks to Sumiregawa-kun for the awesome beta and conversation. - This will most likely be the last update before Christmas._

_"and I lost my sandal. And then I lost... my mind" - best dub mockery ever. Youtube 'Shizuru's Psycho'. _

* * *

_Words alone cannot describe the relationship between Kikukawa Yukino and Suzushiro Haruka. I honestly have no idea what I would say if asked to explain their relationship. They are a special sort of exception to every rule ever written about love, and neither of them really seems to care all that much about how their relationship is neither good for them nor healthy. _

_All I know is that they love each other, even if they can't really love in the way that normal, healthy people would. _

_I hate to say it, but they really have the most damaged relationship I've ever seen. _

_It saddens me to think that all of their love came out of one simple act on Shizuru's part, but it did. And now their love is forever damaged by that fact. _

_They cannot love like we do because they - more Suzushiro than Yukino I think - fear the passionate sort of love that so marks Shizuru and my relationship. _

_They are broken._

* * *

_Five Years Later. _

Kikukawa Yukino could not shake the feeling that she was somehow in the wrong, but listening to Nao's tale shook her deep within her psyche. It was not like Nao to spill the beans, just like that, on anything she'd done - least of all if that action involved one Fujino Shizuru. Fujino brought out the absolute worst in people, and Nao was no exception to that rule. Still, Yukino mused, it did not make any sense for Nao to call her up with the express purpose of essentially bragging about how she'd nearly pushed the former head of Fuuka's student council to a mental break.

A normal person would never do something like that.

While Yukino was hesitant to classify Nao as normal, the fact remained that there was no way that she would do something like what she had just done without some ulterior motive. Nao already had proven time and time again that she knew what she was doing when it came to manipulating the people around her, yet Yukino still worried that she was going to get herself cooled for her glib one of these days.

Yukino just couldn't think of a logical reason why Nao would act in such a way.

It was the sort of behavior that would make Haruka scream and Kuga growl in that irritated fashion that she'd taken to doing more and more often as of late.

An anomaly.

_Anomalies bug me_; the quote from that American television show came to mind almost without reference. Haruka would practice her grandfather's mother tongue whenever she got a chance, even if it meant watching horrible television. Yukino could not understand why the words had stuck with her, but they were the perfect way to explain the way that she felt about what had happened with Nao.

Yukino needed an ear to bounce all of her crazy ideas off of. She knew that she couldn't just let this idea simmer, and telling Haruka was completely off the table, just because of the fact that if she told, she would be forced to handle Haruka's additional barrage of information on top of the series of events that was already consuming much of her concentration.

Yukino really wished that she could have told Haruka, but she didn't want to reopen old wounds. She remembered so many times when Yuuki Nao had been brought in to the Student Council while they'd still been in school, for all sorts of disciplinary measures. From the first time Haruka had laid eyes on Nao, she'd been labeled, as Kuga and many others that Haruka interacted with in an official capacity, as a delinquent with no future.

Somehow, the fact that Kuga was basically running this city's branch of her company and Nao was working high within the ranks of an advertising agency was just cruel irony to Haruka. She still claimed that she was right about them and their bad 'eggs'-ness had yet to show.

Haruka was not the sort to like to be proven wrong. She'd been completely correct about Fujino, even Yukino admitted that.

Still, Fujino had shown up on her doorstep out of the blue on the third anniversary of what had happened that night. Yukino remembered the panic that had welled up in the pit of her stomach then as if it had happened yesterday. There was only so much she could have taken, for the spiraling feeling of panicked motions was barely quelled by the fact that Fujino had seemed intent on apologizing for what had happened.

Yukino remembered being shocked. For the remainder of her high school career, she'd tried to forget the sandy-haired woman as best as she could. Haruka had gone away to Tokyo for University and Yukino had no reason to venture onto Fuuka's college campus as a high school student. Seeing Fujino Shizuru standing on her doorstep with that look of genuine sadness in her eyes had shaken Yukino deeply and she didn't think that she could take ever seeing that again.

She'd resolved to tolerate Fujino, to be nice and to try and forget Haruka's smiling face as she vanished into nothingness.

Yukino couldn't get the image out of her head. It plagued her like a relentless insect, a growing feeling of doubt and suspicion in the pit of her stomach. She could not control her fear of Fujino, but she had to pretend as though she could.

She worked in politics; she was fairly talented at lying.

It went with the territory.

She stepped off the train three stops before her own and made her way though the crowded streets of one of the busiest shopping areas of town. She knew exactly where she was going - for it was only with one pair of ears that Yukino might actually be able to make sense of what it was that Nao was trying to tell her.

There had to be a method the madness. Yukino knew that she was a fool to try and comprehend the mind of Yuuki Nao, but something was wrong. Never before had Nao trusted her friendship enough to act as a confident, and yet she'd spilled the metaphorical beans without so much as the fight she usually put Kuga or Fujino though to get even the slightest tidbit of information out of her.

Why would she do something like this? Yukino wondered, making her way towards the smaller, more authentic shops. There were some other business here, mostly small law firms and the occasional accountant. She was quickly leaving the city behind, moving into the more residential suburbs.

The last house on the road to her left, before it began to meander down by the river that flowed through (and sometimes under) the town, was a gated one, but Yukino knew where to go to knock and gain admission.

Classes were in session after all.

A young boy with large glasses wearing a pair of loose pants and a t-shirt opened the door, "What do you want?" He demanded angrily - as though Yukino's presence was somehow offensive to him as a person.

Yukino was used to it; she worked for the scum of the earth. She'd been told by her first client that she would be selling her soul working with him. Yukino had simply smiled and nodded, her soul was already sold to a devil that was far more fun to be around than most of the stuffy old men that Yukino seemed to surround herself with these days.

_I wonder if being a HiME damns me twice over? _

"I need to speak to your master; I believe she's giving lessons?" Yukino had never really liked young children; she found them far too stressful to be around for their own good. Mostly she just avoided them as best she could.

The boy frowned at her, but stepped away from the door and then ran off, shouting something about a 'stuffy librarian' here to see the master.

Yukino didn't have the heart to correct him. Librarian did sound like a welcome reprieve from the usual shrewd looks she got for being a member of a politician's staff. Yukino sighed; she _had_ decided to go into a line of work that guaranteed her the disdain and mistrust of most of the educated population. And in Japan, in this day and age, that accounted for quite a large percentage.

Yukino removed her shoes and padded in stocking-covered feet down the hall after the bespectacled boy. She stopped in front of the first door and glanced around it. At least twenty children were facing her, all holding stances that Yukino had only seen in those martial arts films that Haruka liked to watch upon occasion. She'd never been into a dojo of any martial art before, and the sudden feeling of remorse filled her.

_I should go back and wait by the door. _She didn't want to interrupt a class, and it was obvious that her presence had not gone unnoticed. Yukino felt her skin begin to crawl as at least fifteen pairs of eyes all turned as one to look at her.

Yukino had never been good at being the center of attention.

A sharp voice cut through the sudden silence that had fallen. Yukino turned just in time to hear the barking order of: "Push ups, now."

Yukino smiled, for she'd never had someone simply order physical exertion on her behalf. Sure, they were children, but they were staring at her. "Akira-" she began, but bit back to honorific that really didn't seem appropriate any more. Back in school, when Okuzaki Akira and Mai's little brother Takumi had first started to help out on the student council, the affectionate nickname had been applicable simply because no one was really sure of Akira's gender.

"Miss Kikukawa." Akira said respectfully. She stepped out of the room where the students were slowly stopping in their task to stare at the two of them conversing. Pulling the door closed, she turned once again to look at Yukino a little more closely. "What are you doing here?"

It was true that Yukino had been to this place of residence a grand total of two times, and both of those were for the surprise birthday parties that Takumi and Akira always put on for Mai. She'd never been here of her own accord, and she really was imposing. "I need to run something by you, but you're teaching - I can come back, or call."

Akira shrugged, "We were pretty much done anyway." She stared hard at Yukino and then added, almost as an afterthought. "Hold on." She pulled the door back open and stepped into the room, closing it behind her and leaving Yukino once more standing alone in the hallway.

The low buzz of Akira's voice through the door was followed by a series of loud 'whoops' from the children inside and then a general clatter of many pairs of feet hurrying to leave.

Akira pulled the door open, bowing as she left to the students who were still eyeing the door curiously. "We should be left alone now; I've sent them home now."

_This is the day for strange conversations,_ Yukino mused as she followed Akira further back into the house. It looked more lived-in here, with mail on the sideboard and dirty laundry piled up in the bathroom hamper.

"Would you like some tea?" Akira asked, turning into a very western kitchen and heading towards the stove.

"Oh, no, but thank you." Yukino answered. She wasn't quite sure how to put her thoughts on the situation, but she knew that she had to run it by someone else, and Akira was the most level-headed person she could think of to do the job.

Akira went though the motions of making tea with such precision that Yukino could see that, despite her boyish looks and mannerisms, she was very skilled at the art. Yukino smiled, for she knew that that watching a person makes tea was fairly reflective of their personality, no matter who they were. Akira was all about the procedure - strictly business.

Yukino had seen Fujino make tea, with the flare and ceremony of one formally trained in the traditional art. While Yukino herself was far more practical, she had to admit that a bit of flair never really hurt a mundane act like making tea that much.

As Akira set the kettle onto the stove and motioned for Yukino to sit down, she asked, "What is this all about?"

"A little while I got a phone call from Yuuki Nao." Yukino began, sitting and folding her hands in front of her in that business-like manner that seemed to win her so much support with the political candidates. "She spun me a story that I would have trouble believing if it was anyone but Nao telling it to me."

Akira raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"She told me about how at the meeting a few days ago, she baited Fujino - as she usually does - only this time she thought that she'd gone too far," Yukino explained. She would have trouble voicing her concerns; she knew it, mostly because she had no real idea how to make this story seem any less unbelievable. "I'm here because I think in that phone call; Nao was trying to tell me something else."

Akira leaned back in her chair, tipping it back towards the wall. She blew her bangs out of her eyes, "Nao is a fairly private person, Miss Kikukawa – always has been. For her to open up to you is rather odd and defiantly out of character for her."

"Yukino is fine," Yukino said automatically. She always felt like her mother when she was called by her last name, and while it was expected in her work, she preferred to be known for who she was, and not who her parents were. "That's why I'm coming to you. She has no reason to deviate for her usual confidents unless she cannot get her point across to them."

Akira nodded.

"I think that she called me because she realized just how out of character she was acting."

"It's hardly out of character for Nao to try and piss someone off," Akira pointed out with the air of someone stating the very, very obvious.

"That I won't argue," Yukino agreed. She shifted her weight and tried to get comfortable in the hard backed kitchen chair that Akira had offered her. The hard wood was unrelenting on her rear and Yukino wished that they'd retired to a different room where at least there would be cushions. "What bothers me more is this. Nao doesn't have a death wish, as far as I know - she has no reason to push Fujino so far that she breaks. Her banter is always playful, Akira, a bit malicious, but mostly playful. She had no reason to say those things - and I think she realized it."

"So she called you?"

Yukino knew that she sounded like a fool. There had to be a better way to get this point across. "She knows that she's pushing her actions to an extreme, and she doesn't know why. She asked us for help - to figure this out."

"Why not go to Kuga?" Akira asked, tipping her chair back forward and leaning on the kitchen table. Yukino could tell that she was trying to put her mind around the conflict as best she could. It wasn't nearly enough, but Yukino was grateful for the effort.

"Kuga's too close to this. She's involved, so she can't see Nao being anything but herself," Yukino said thoughtfully, "Plus, I think there's something Kuga's not telling us about that first attack."

"You too, huh?"

Yukino nodded.

How were they to fight this 'great evil' together if they could not trust each other with the whole truth?

* * *

The orphan was moving very fast for the erratic motions that three miss-matched feet allowed. Nao gritted her teeth and continued to push forward, steadfastly ignoring the laughable appearance of the creature and the plethora of jokes that came to her mind when looking at it. She'd been feeling off all day, and the fact that she'd had to reach out to someone outside of her comfort zone was really starting to aggravate her. She didn't need to be up half the night chasing orphans across the city. As it was, she was getting four hours of sleep a night. It was starting to affect her judgment, making her do things that she would never do in a normal, sane setting.

Kuga raised her hand and the group slowed. The rancid smell of the orphan was getting stronger, which meant that they were gaining on it - Nao wasn't sure that that was a good thing. She flexed her hands, willing her claws into reality. The stench was making the hairs on the back of her neck stand up, filling her with the sensation that she was being watched.

It was because of that sensation that she had no wish to summon Julia, she wanted to prevent whatever it was that was watching them from seeing too much of her child outside of close combat. From the looks of it, most of the HiME were tying to keep their children has hidden as possible - just so as to avoid the weakness of having them out in the open.

Nao hated to think of what was going to happen if what she'd done to Fujino came back to bite her in the ass. _What sucks more is that Fujino's bound to notice a general lack of Kuga if she tries anything, _Nao thought bitterly. _Damn green sparkles. _ As it was, she didn't really want to face the fact that she'd potentially signed her own death warrant. She couldn't understand _why_ she'd done it.

She'd just interned to antagonize Fujino as she always did. They'd known each other for long enough that the circumstances, presuming Kuga had been honest with Fujino, were something that Nao had full right to mock Fujino about.

_It had just come out all wrong. _

And now everything was wrong.

"Smells horrid," she muttered to Kuga, who was peering around the corner with a pensive look on her face.

"Tell me about it," Kuga agreed. She motioned for them to go forward once more, and Nao broke out into a run once more. She'd called Kikukawa because she was pretty sure that she could figure out what was going on.

She'd had no reason to push that far.

She liked being alive, thank you.

_So why? _

Nao didn't know.

Kuga had lead them into a large clearing - the sight of a building that had been demolished a few weeks ago if Nao remembered correctly. A recent earthquake had shaken some of the support beams lose and the building had been deemed unsafe.

The orphan was nowhere in sight.

"Where'd it go?" Mikoto demanded her grip on her sword tightening as she peered towards the sky.

Nao, too, looked upwards, her ears hearing something else.

The sound of clapping. The sound of thousands upon thousands of hands coming together – as though they were mega-idols and not a ragtag bunch of girls with no hope of ever truly understanding what they were involved in.

_What the fuck? _

"I see that you have finally tracked us down."


	17. Chapter 17

**Passages, Chapter Seventeen**

_AN - College eats your soul like nothing else. I swear to god. But OMG new Mai-series is coming out soon. _

_Enjoy this chapter in wake of that news, and be reminded that I like long analysis type reviews. 8D... mostly because they give me ideas._

* * *

Yuuki Nao's claws extended and retracted as she cracked her knuckles, making ready her defense. She could not believe that they'd somehow managed to walk right into the enemy's trap. _Stupid, stupid, stupid. _No matter how she thought about it, there were just too many inconsistencies in this story, and she knew that she, at least, was dumb enough to waltz into a trap without a clear plan and at least three escape plans.. They must have been tracked, anything to make herself and Kuga seem less foolish for waltzing right into the hands of the enemy.

Still, Nao felt like an idiot for falling to the bait. They had taken it upon themselves to stop the attacks of the orphans in their city, and of course it had to turn out that the attacks were a method of driving them out.

"They've got eyes on us," she muttered to Kuga, who was peering around into the dim gloom of the construction site with narrowed eyes and a scowl crossing her face that made her look years older, looking for the source of the voice. "Cameras, you think?"

"No shit, Nao." Kuga muttered back, her guns pointed in either direction, covering as much ground as she could. Nao allowed her claws to extent once more as she stepped backwards to cover as much of Kuga's back as she could. She didn't have a ranged weapon like Kuga, but her webs and wire were enough to provide Kuga with a chance to get a shot off. They had to protect each other, especially if they were going to be potentially captured. Kuga would not go down without a fight, and Nao was not about to offer herself up to Fujino on a platter just because she'd failed to protect precious Natsuki from harm. Despite Nao's misgivings, however, the feeling felt somehow right - protecting Kuga and the integrity of the HiME.

Nao wondered if this was what they were supposed to have done in the first place - for it felt far more right than attempting to kill her peers. She supposed that she'd have to ask Kuga about it some time when they were not potentially going to have to shoot their way out of this demolished building site. Kuga was not the sort to think of anything but what her current problem was – and though she liked to plough head on through battles, she was actually a fairly good strategist when it came to figuring out what was the next possible move for the HiME. Nao didn't think that she'd seen this coming, for Nao herself certainly had not. They just wanted to track the orphan, not risk potentially getting killed because of them.

_Fujino'd have my head if anything happens. _Nao thought bitterly as she readied her defense against the noticeably absent orphan.

"Really, I'm surprised that you got this far without something unsavory happening to any of you." The voice above them continued. Nao squinted her eyes; the half-light of the empty, rubble-filled lot they'd chased the orphan into was no problem for her eyes, for all the HiME were able to navigate in the relative darkness. She still could not see anything that would point to signs of life, evil or otherwise, in the shadows. She frowned and looked upwards, towards the barest glimpse of the night sky that she could take in from the vantage point of this bright city - the sky was their key, and she could see the hulking form of something far above their heads. She jerked her head at Kuga, nodding to the form.

"Speakers?" she muttered quietly, her eyes narrowed. The unknown voice and the surrounding circumstances were just a little too Eighties for her taste, and everything about this place reeked of cheesy grade B horror movie. She knew that Kuga could sense it to, but Kuga was far more stoic than Nao could ever be - she needed her emotions to get what she wanted, whereas Kuga already had everything she could possibly want.

Kuga grunted in assent. Her guns were going up and down the building, constantly in motion, yet trained on the lurking Orphan. Nao knew that it would be foolish to give up the advantage of knowing where their enemy was before the time came for it to attack once more.

"Ah, the stoic, fighter types. They never talk much, preferring to smash, grunt and kill. My kind of people, really." The voice had turned colder and Nao felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up and a chill run up her spine. Whomever possessed this sleek and smooth female voice was not one that Nao wanted to run afoul of, no matter who she had backing her.

Still, Nao felt a smirk growing across her face. This voice, whoever it was, had no idea who she was. Sure, she had Kuga pegged down quite well, but Nao knew that she was nothing like Kuga, whereas this voice assumed she was. _First mistake,_ she brought a nail up to her mouth and took it into her mouth in what she was sure Kuga would have called obscene if she had been paying attention, and sucked on it for a few long seconds. _Never underestimate me._ This was her opportunity to strike this haughty voice down, to take it and show it just how much of a fool it was for getting involved with the HiME - with Yuuki Nao. "A fighter, you say?" She asked, carefully removing her finger from her mouth so as not to cut herself on the razor sharp metal nail of her element. "I hardly would call myself that. I'm a lover, you see."

Kuga snorted quietly, and muttered something about Nao doing her best fighting on her back with her legs spread. Nao would have to make her feel guilty about that later, for Kuga was basically calling her a whore, which was not exactly the word that Nao would use to describe herself. There were others, slightly more tasteful, and far more descriptive. Right now, however, they had bigger fish to fry, and a looking orphan that would not be simply going away when they found the source of the voice.

The voice was silent for a long time after Nao's proclamation, and the redhead felt as though she was being scrutinized by a thousand pairs of eyes. Nao squirmed, and pulled her jacket more tightly around her weary frame. They hadn't been sleeping much lately, for their brilliant idea of trapping an Orphan required far more attention than Nao was willing to give it. They all had lives and work to do, and this idea was insane as it was.

"One day, little whore, you and all your friends will be on your knees before my awesome might. And perhaps you may even enjoy it." The voice laughed, a cruel and hollow sound that did little to abate the growing feeling of dread in the pit of Nao's stomach. She wanted to be away from here, far, far away. "You are the same as you were the last time we fought, and the time before that. Nothing ever changes in this conflict of souls. One will always win out over the other, and this time, like all the times before, I shall claim victory!"

Kuga's guns rang out a sharp report and suddenly the monarchial laughter of the voice was cut off into silence. "Damn big-headed villians and their monologues." Nao shot the taller woman a confused look and raised her eyebrow. Kuga looked sheepish and added, "Jun and I were watching an American movie the other day, and the villain kept on getting off subject and monologuing, leaving opportunities for the hero to attack him."

Nao thought that was very fitting and was about to tell Kuga so when the large mass of orphan dropped down from the sky and slashed forward with long and dangerously sharp claws. Nao jumped to the left and lost sight of Kuga as she landed up to her knees in gravel and broken glass. She hissed loudly and extended her claws above her head, allowing the wires to loop around one of the still standing structure beams of demolished building. There. Now she had a way out.

Another series of shots cut though the night as Kuga tried to hit the beast with her guns - but the beasts had gotten smarter since she'd first fired upon it, what seemed like hours ago. It twisted and contorted its body in impossible ways, avoiding the shots and pushing Kuga back through the rubble and away from Nao.

From her vantage point, Nao could see nothing but the dark hulk of the orphan, claws slashing through the rubble as it tried to halt Kuga's escape. She tried to reach out to help with her free hand, but when Kuga's voice rang out in a pained shout, Nao knew that she could not simply stay here and wait for the beast to attack her. No, she had to attack back.

"Oh no you don't," Nao said through gritted teeth. She bit her tongue and pulled herself up the wires - finding it to be far harder than it had been when she was still a child. She was out of practice with this fighting game, and she did not want to have to see any of her friends get hurt now that they'd finally been presented with a target they could fight. She clambered onto the top of the beam structure and raced down the still standing parts of building towards Kuga. Her feet slid on the sloping surface, but she got enough speed to launch herself into the air.

Nao extended her claws as she fell, bracing herself for impact and hoping that she didn't accidentally impale herself on one of the orphan's many head spikes. She landed awkwardly, her claws sinking through the creature's head and into the soft tissue within, but her body bouncing against its hard exterior. She grunted and tightened her grip. The orphan roared in agony and rose up onto its hind quarters, giving Kuga the perfect shot of its underbelly. Kuga took the clumsily, Nao noticed, one arm handing limply at her side, a very large splinter of wood piercing the skin of her upper arm.

"Are you alright?" she shouted as the creature started to fade away into nothing. Nao willed her claws to disappear and quickly disentangled herself from the orphan before it vanished quickly. She was quite content to keep the green sparkles that signified the death of an orphan as far away from her person as possible – for she never wanted to touch someone who was vanishing into nothingness again. Nao ran forward, trying to get through the debris to Kuga, to see what had happened to her.

Kuga dropped her one remaining onto the ground and hissed in pain as she grabbed at the piece of wood. "I'm fine," she grunted, but Nao could see that she could not get a good enough grip on the wood embedded in her arm to pull it out. She gestured to the wood as best she could and barked, "Help me get this thing out."

Nao tutted as she inspected the wound, it wasn't deep, but getting the wood out was going to hurt, a lot. "You're always getting hurt on these missions, Kuga. Do I detect some sort of pain fetish?" She couldn't help but tease the older woman, for she was by far the most infuriating woman that Nao had ever met, and the sight of her in pain was almost too much for Nao to handle. She wanted to run forward, to kiss Kuga and to tell her that everything would be alright.

_Only if she heard it from me, she'd probably shoot me here and get it over with._ Nao thought bitterly.

"Only in your dreams, Nao." Kuga spat back, closing her eyes against the pain as Nao carefully pulled the older woman's leather jacket away from the wound. The splinter of wood had cut through Natsuki's arm, but thankfully was not that deep of a wound - just glancing off an artery and creating a lot of blood. Nao gripped the shaft and looked hard at Kuga, who seemed to be resigned to the fact that even with a HiME's accelerated healing capabilities; this was still going to hurt like a mother fucker.

Nao had often wanted to find a way to test Kuga's pain thresholds, because she seemed to be practically immune to it in a way that made Nao more than a little jealous. Kuga was, after all, the perfect soldier. Nao knew her own threshold well, as it was one of the few things that she was not into when it came to sex – sex was supposed to be enjoyable, and when you had to deal with weirdos like Kuga throwing a monkey wrench into the works with their self-suffering and clearly masochistic tendicies, things just got ugly.

"Just do it." Kuga grunted, her teeth clenched.

Nao nodded and pulled back on the wood, jerking it away from Kuga's arm and throwing it to the side. There were still remnants of wood within the arm, but with a day or two of rest, Kuga's body - like all the HiME's - would simply reject the wood from her system and push it out. It was unnatural how quickly the HiME healed and Nao was always wary to not test her limits the way that Kuga constantly put hers to the test.

Kuga sighed happily and Nao smiled. Kuga would be alright. Pulling off the scarf that she'd tied around her neck far earlier that morning, Nao quickly bound the wound to stop father bleeding. Something inside her screamed that she should not be so good at doing this - for even the loss of her eye had not been all that major of a wound. Nao had been positive that if she had had time to wait that her eye would have come back when she'd lost it. But then that damn interfering creature, Kazehana had gone and reset their lives, thinking that it would make them all happier, better people.

_They fucking weren't. _

Nao leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on Natsuki's forehead, "Let's get you home," she muttered.

Kuga said nothing but allowed herself to be carried back and away from the battle scene.

* * *

Fujino Shizuru had not been expecting to see Kikukawa Yukino outside her door any time in the near future. But as she opened her door to the bitingly cold wind outside, she took a step back and allowed herself the briefest moment of question. _Why is she here? W hat sort of horrible news does she come bearing this time?_ Shizuru was no fool, and she knew that the mousey girl was terrified of her, no matter what bravado she put on around the other HiME. None of the other HiME, save Yuuki Nao, who had her own issues, had seen what sort of damage Shizuru was capable of creating – so they had no reason to fear her as Yuuki and Kikukawa did.

Shizuru stepped aside and graciously let the younger woman into her home, her thoughts drifting to the reasons for this suddenly out of character gesture from Yukino. She couldn't' think of a reason why she would be here, and she could not find the words within herself to ask. She knew that Kikukawa would tell her on her own time - as that was the nature of their relationship.

"Would you like some tea?" Shizuru asked. She had been in the process of making herself some when Kikukawa had knocked on the door, and she wasn't about to let someone as meek as Yukino stop her from her evening routine. If she'd brought her _dog_ along, maybe, but then again; Shizuru had never had much patience for small-minded dictators.

"No thank you." Yukino looked awkward, uncomfortable and blinking in the bright light of Shizuru's kitchen.

_Just the way I want her, so that she can't sneak up on me again. _

"Look - Fujino - I'll make this brief. We both have people and lives we should be concentrating on." It was odd to her Kikugawa being so direct, but Shizuru had to say that it was a welcome change for her normal quiet exterior. She remembered when Natsuki had told her that Kikukawa had been elected to take Shizuru's own place as the head of the student council at Fuuka. In all honesty, Shizuru had not thought that Yukino had had it in her, but she'd been a well-respected and liked member of the Fuuka student body and perfect for the job. Shizuru guessed that it was just the way that these things were supposed to be, it wasn't really her place to question them.

Shizuru set down her teacup and nodded. She could play that game, even if no one else in this house could. "I agree." _Natsuki is far too blunt to ask for such forthrightness, she'd just expect it going in. _Shizuru smiled privately, _Natsuki can be quite the fool at times. _

"I think that this new foe we're facing might be trying to force all of us - you especially - into doing something that you will regret the moment you return to your senses."

This was hardly news, but Shizuru decided to humor the shorter woman. "And?" She asked, her tone pleasantly interested, but not overtly so.

"What Yuuki said to you, I think that she was trying to goad you, because that is what she does, but you and I both know that she is hardly suicidal and to do what she did would be considered madness by anyone who went through what she did back then."

The thought had also occurred to Natsuki, but Shizuru kept herself quiet. "Do you think that the enemy has gotten to Yuuki?" Wouldn't that just be her luck? _A chance to kill the bitch once and for all so that there would never be another threat to Natsuki and their love ever again._

"No, but I think that the enemy has a way of enhancing aspects of our personalities at certain moments when it is crucial that we are fully in control."


	18. Chapter 18

**Passages, Chapter Eighteen  
**

_AN - First off, don't tell me you didn't see it coming. I've been setting off the events of this chapter for like seriously the whole story. But Natsuki's dumb as a brick and can't put two and two together and get four, so it took a long time. Then again, lol we have a bad guy (chick really) who gets no attention in this chapter... because I'm really lazy._

_ And you people, really. When I get like five hundred hits on a chapter and three reviews, I don't know what I'm doing wrong. SO TELL ME. Please._

_btw, a conbini is Japanese slang (and pretty commonly used slang) for a Seven-Eleven type establishment. I'm usually averse to putting stuff like that into an english story, as it's just... annoying, but it really just sort of worked there. I'm the worst author ever. _:(_  
_

* * *

_The first time that Shizuru and I were completely honest with each other about our feelings, was nearly a year and a half after the end of the carnival. I don't remember what prompted this particular revelation in my wanting to be open with Shizuru came from, but I think it might have had something to do with the fact that I'd hurt myself again, and while it wasn't serious, it still was serious enough for me to need her help getting around. I'd fallen in gym class and twisted my wrist in such a way that it made in next to impossible for me to write for the few days that it took the HiME's healing rate to fully recover from the blow. Still, my pride was wounded and while I asked Mai to simply photocopy her notes for me, Shizuru would hear of no such thing and threatened to follow me to class and take my notes for me like some kind of dog. She never actually held true to her threat, but I could sense the sick enjoyment that she got out of teasing me; she's always been like that and I find it incredibly frustrating._

_I've never been an open person about anything - and people don't need to venture as far as my private life to see that. Mai tells me that I should be friendlier, because it would help me to understand where she and her 'friends' get their easy social dynamic. It's not my fault that I never really had a formal family to teach me how to interact with other people, and people tend to forget that I have that handicap these days. Shizuru's getting to me, making me a civilized human being once again. _

_I can't stand it._

_I'm not a very honest person, really, when it comes to my feelings. I close myself off and try not to think about all the chances that I know are just passing me by. The chance to smile, to nod, to laugh with the person I love; I just let them slip through my fingers, forcing Shizuru to take desperate measures if she wants to even get a rise out of me. I guess that was why it was so hard for us to finally be honest with each other._

_At the end of the day of the carnival, after we'd all been ripped from the peaceful oblivion that was our deaths - drawn back to fight that final battle that Mai could not possibly win by herself; I drove Nao to see her mother in a hospital nearly two hours away from Fuuka proper. Nao had no ride, and at world's end the buses and trains stopped running. Once we'd put together what Kazehana had given us, Shizuru vanished into the growing dawn and I was left standing between Kikukawa and Nao, wondering who would be less likely to try and kill Shizuru once again for what she'd done to them. Nao did something amazing then - to my mind at the time - she smiled and calmly asked me to drive her nearly fifty miles though the mountains to see her mother. _

_I did so without a thought. I needed to think as it was, and even though she'd totaled my bike and I'd nearly destroyed my new one - I still had my first motorcycle, the old Suzuki model that I'd bought using my father's money just to spite him. It still ran alright, but I was far more interested in getting away from Fuuka at that point to think of the potential repercussions of my actions. _

_I drove Nao away into the mountains, to a hospital free of First District and Searrs, where her mother had finally woken up from a coma that she'd been in for most of Nao's life. I came back to Fuuka hours later, dead tired and wanting nothing more than to sleep. I knew that I would have to face what happened to me - to all of us - eventually. It was an inevitable conclusion to our actions, but I was so dog tired that all I wanted to do was function like a proper HiME and just go into a rejuvenating sleep until I was ready to face the music, as it were. _

_Shizuru was waiting at my apartment. I supposed that I should have seen that coming, for she and I had so much to say to each other. I had no words at that moment, and I didn't for the following year and a half. We just sort of fell into each other's arms and stayed that way. It wasn't exactly sex, but something far more intimate than that. _

_I didn't tell her I loved her for a year and a half, she never said it to me until that moment. With her every action, Shizuru reaffirmed my belief that I was telling her the truth, that I was doing the right thing._

_I could never betray that love, no matter what came in between us. We are a matched set, and no one can change that._

* * *

_Five years later._

Kuga Natsuki hissed in pain as Nao shoved her onto the back of her motorcycle and pressed Natsuki's spare helmet over her head and fastened it. Nao put on Natsuki's own helmet, fiddling with the straps until it fit, and clambered on in front of her. "This is going to be interesting," Natsuki hissed through clenched teeth as she settled in behind Nao. She had one arm free to hang onto the red head as they traveled through the city, her other arm dangled uselessly in the makeshift sling that Nao had made using pieces of her already ripped jacket.

"It's going to get even more interesting once we get you home and Fujino sees what that creature did to you." Nao grinned. Natsuki thought she was far too gung-ho about bearing witness to the upcoming confrontation with Shizuru's already weak hold on her self-control. Nao was a risk taker, a gambler who liked nothing better than to push the odds of her winning even father than was logically acceptable. She was trying to get herself killed, and Natsuki didn't know what to say to her to stop it.

Natsuki shrugged as best she could with a painfully injured arm and tried not to think about Nao driving her motorcycle. She had to hang on for dear life as it was, and she didn't want to worry about anything else at the moment.

But Nao's words rang true. They had a voice, and a motive to attach to their enemy now, and that was a problem for them. She knew that if Shizuru caught wind of the fact that they might actually have a tangible enemy, she would be unstoppable. First District had been foolish, Natsuki knew, leaving the way to their infrastructure so open and vulnerable to attack - it had been their downfall, and what had eventually driven Shizuru and Natsuki to leave Fuuka and the surrounding townships all together.

"Watch it!" Natsuki shouted as Nao took a corner a little too sharply for her taste. Natsuki had not been expecting to have to lean into the turns, but Nao was driving the 'bike like a pro – far better than the last time she'd driven anything of Natsuki's – and therefore there were the sharp, deep turns that Natsuki herself favored while driving. It was hard to hang on with her arm still smarting as much as it was. Natsuki knew that she would have to down at least half their bottle of painkillers when she got home - she just hoped that Nao would remember that they lived on opposite ends of town and that Natsuki could not, under any circumstance, crash on Nao's couch.

That was just a really bad idea, and one that Natsuki had been entertaining when she realized that even though it was close to two in the morning, there were still many cars on the road that made her journey longer and considerably more awkward - as Natsuki's bleeding arm was drawing many stares from passers-by. They could not risk pushing Shizuru further, and even though Natsuki hated it, she realized that she was doing this for Nao far more than for herself. Had this not been a time of war, where battles lasted long into the night and she often fell asleep not really knowing if she'd wake up in the morning to find that it was the end of the world.

Nao drove them in silence, which Natsuki took to be concentration, for she didn't really blame Nao for not wanting to talk right now. Nao had slipped up, badly. Natsuki knew that Nao felt thing for her that she shouldn't - that no one other than Shizuru should; and yet she could not simply shove the redhead out of her life. There was too much at stake with each and every passing moment that Natsuki could not simply wish away. They had to be careful - so careful.

Natsuki could not admit that she was terrified of whatever it was that Nao felt in connection to her. They slowed and stopped at a traffic light, Natsuki watching the lights of the city around them begin to blur. "You messed up," She muttered into Nao's back.

Nao grunted, twisting away from Natsuki and turning around as best she could to frown at her. "I never really appreciate it when people tell me that I've messed up. It's almost never my fault."

_Her mother. Shit._ Natsuki shook her head, "This is getting really messed up Nao." It was starting to dawn on her that Nao was being a little bit more than her usually unfriendly self recently. Sure, the enemy had been doing something - Natsuki wasn't sure what, to push the envelope of Shizuru's fragile sanity and Natsuki's patience. Sure, Natsuki was just as guilty for what happened with Nao, and the fact that Nao was summoning her claws once more seemed to suggest that she'd found someone who was importantly enough to her to actually fuel the summon once more. "Why do you care so much for that you have suddenly lost all sight of what really matters in the world? You're goading Shizuru, pushing her to all levels of insanity; and you're fighting with no thought to yourself." Natsuki exhaled and fixed Nao with her best icy glare. "Do you forget who it is that we fight for?"

Nao revved the engine and did not respond. The light changed and she shot across the intersection at a far greater speed and Natsuki felt comfortable with. Nao was being foolish, yet again. Natsuki was comforted by the fact that Nao could not speed, however, for fear of getting stopped and having to explain Natsuki's injury and her lack of motorcycle license. Natsuki cursed quietly and wondered what exactly it was that was driving Nao to this level of non-communication.

Her arm throbbed as she clung to the smaller frame of Nao; the redhead hadn't grown much since middle school, and tried to remember why it was that she'd decided to chase an orphan across the city. Natsuki's arm throbbed more and more with every bump in the road, and soon she was biting her tongue to keep herself from shouting for Nao to stop at a conbini or a service station so that she could run in and get some pain killers to at least dull the pain before she could get to the more heavy-duty horse-pills she had at home.

Nao seemed to sense Natsuki's desperation for something to distract herself from the pain in her arm, and she broke her silence at the next traffic light they were stopped at. "Look, Kuga." She started her voice sounding thick against the helmet she'd shoved on at the beginning of the ride.

She wouldn't turn around. Natsuki just let her head rest against Nao's shoulder as she continued to maintain her one armed vice grip on Nao's torso. She was afraid if she let go, she wouldn't be able to grab hold of her once again, and they still had at least ten minutes before they were within Natsuki's district and another five minutes to get to the apartment.

"The reason we're fighting, it's stupid, right?" Nao mused, revving the engine of the motorcycle. "We fight because of the person we love most in the world. And we put that person on the line every time we go into battle." Nao trailed off thoughtfully, her head tilting upwards to the light they were waiting for. She turned to face Natsuki then, and Natsuki suddenly saw the pain in her eyes.

_What?_

"What does it feel like, Natsuki, knowing that if you fuck up - if you do even one thing wrong, you could make Fujino disappear for ever?" Nao asked.

Natsuki sighed, she'd been wondering when Nao would finally come to the realization that whomever it was that she'd now found to be so important to her that she could summon her elements once again was now in danger of vanishing into nothingness if Nao messed up. It was a hard burden, she admitted it freely, but it was something that she and Shizuru shared, a certain understanding that they never really needed to talk about. They were going to die together, they'd done it once and Natsuki knew that whoever died first, the other would not be long in following into the black.

"It's hard," she admitted. Natsuki didn't' really know what Nao wanted to hear, but words of comfort had never been her strong suit to begin with. It was better to be honest and hope that she somehow did not come to regret it later on. "I hate seeing her go into battle, but at the same time, I know that she's strong. Stronger than I'll ever be."

_I depend on that strength, for without it, we'd both disappear._ Natsuki added silent, cursing her own insecurities and fear of losing Shizuru.

Nao nodded, and revved the engine once more, and they passed the rest of the ride in silence. Nao made sort order of the rest of the trip and soon she was helping Natsuki off of the back of the bike. "You're getting old, Kuga. Slow." Nao grinned, slipping an arm under Natsuki's shoulder and settling it around her hip, effectively helping the taller woman to walk while still keeping Natsuki's arm out of harm's way until they could get it inside and looked at. Natsuki swayed, for it was almost like being drunk, and the sudden and continued proximity to Nao, when she could have walked perfectly well on her own was sending up all sorts of warning bells in her mind. What was Nao playing at? Natsuki narrowed her eyes, but the pain in her arm was almost too much for her to handle.

"At least I didn't get called a whore by the enemy." Natsuki countered with the best amused smile that she could muster, "What was with that? It was almost as though that voice didn't know you as well as I do, I'd never do that to your face."

Nao shook her head, and Natsuki could see a faint blush on her cheeks, "It's nothing. I'm used to it."

_Ah, the insulations we've made about every man she ever interacted with and the jokes we make about her boyfriends._ Natsuki nodded.

They stepped into the building's lone elevator and Natsuki produced her key and passed it to Nao. As a family with a child, they were given the elevator key that the building management usually reserved for the elderly and delivery men. The elevator whirred to life and Natsuki allowed herself to move away from Nao and to lean against the cool metal siding of the elevator. She glanced down at her arm, she'd lost a lot of blood and she'd been out of it for at least a day or two. She was privately happy that it was a Friday evening and her position in the company actually gave her the opportunity to take the weekend if she needed it. She usually didn't, because Shizuru was home and Jun usually had work to do and it was boring with just her old X-Box and Shizuru's disapproving stare when she didn't do anything for long periods of time.

"Kuga, I've got something to tell you." Nao began, her voice shaky.

Natsuki looked up as sharply as she could, her eyes fixed on Nao, for she knew that this could lead to only bad things, for Nao having news was almost never a good thing. She made an affirmative noise and waited for Nao to continue.

Nao didn't say anything for a long time, and the expressions that drifted across her face seemed to indicate, Natsuki thought, that she was really torn about what she should do right now.

Nao took a step forward, and then another. She leaned forward and carefully brushed her lips across Natsuki's own, pausing for longer than a casual kiss should have lasted.

Natsuki's eyes went wide.

Oh this was not good, not good at all.

The elevator dinged and rumbled to a stop, the doors creaking open just in time for Natsuki to catch a glimpse of retreating mousy-brown hair and glasses.

_Shit, Yukino._


	19. Chapter 19

**Passages, Chapter Nineteen**

_AN - So yeah, I really should stop making the lives of all these poor people so sad, but don't be afraid, readership, I know where this fic is going! WOOOOOT. Keep up the good work and reviews, it's so nice to actually get input on what I do. _

* * *

_I have to stop writing in these notebooks; I know it's bad to leave information out in the open that anyone can find, and paranoia about all the times that I've accidentally let myself open for attack because of a foolish move like that seems to run rampantly through me at every chance.. I'm going to take these pages and pages of notes and do something with them that will make it so that they are never a risk to myself, or my family. Maybe I'll throw them in a river, but I've got Midori's notes on the HiME, at least the ones she did while we were still at Fuuka to worry about as well. There's no way that I can leave something as potentially damaging to the HiME around for just anyone to see. I'll lock them up, in a safety deposit box in a Swiss bank when I find myself in _ _Europe__ next. Shizuru's always wanted to leave Japan, to experience the rest of the world – and Jun needs to see that the world cannot be contained on this one little island that is constantly in danger of falling back into the ocean with every passing earthquake. I can get rid of these papers, once and for all, it shouldn't be a problem. For the first time in my life, I feel as though I have something that I desperately need to protect. It's a good feeling, and one that I'm still getting accustomed to.. _

_I'm so used to being alone, and now the feeling of being loved, of being worth something, has come and bitten me in the ass. I don't quite know how to take everything that's happened since the carnival. We don't even have our powers any more, and we're drifting apart because we were never held together by a strong bond to begin with. We just are. _

_We are just twelve people who will never look at the world the same away again after what happened to us. _

_Still, I should stop writing things down. Shizuru seems to think that it's good, cathartic even, for me to actually put pen to paper and record my feelings. She's always trying to get me to open up in one way or another, and I think that I have grown far too comfortable with avoiding her when I simply need to be alone. I write things down instead – and it doesn't help anyone, because I'd be buggered if I let Shizuru read my musings on her and our life together. _

_But still, we're going to be done with school very soon, and I know that the university that I suffered so hard to get into in the first place will actually make due on its promises of a good, stable job sometime in the near future. I just want for us to finally have a chance at being truly happy - even if we spend so much time lying to each other. _

_I want to tell Shizuru the truth about so many things, but every time I open my mouth to say something, it just gets muddled up and comes out wrong. We have so many little things, stupid things really, that get between us and makes us fight. I'm not afraid, per say, that I will do something that might give me away as not being completely honest about the way I feel about some of the things that Shizuru and I disagree on; but I'm just so wary all the time of how even one miss-spoken word could take something minor to a whole new level of awful circumstances. _

_We've had our share of those already, and I've no desire to send us back down that path once more. _

_We'll walk on glass until I figure out how to be a better person, and I'll someday stop writing._

* * *

_Five Years Later _

Yuuki Nao could not believe herself at times. She'd been sitting on this particular dilemma for months now, and she'd been forced, in light of recent events, over the metaphorical edge to an extreme of emotions that she was not at all comfortable with. She did not like knowing that she finally had a face to assign to the most important person in her life, and the fact that it was Kuga just made life all the worse.

She should not be in love with someone so clearly inaccessible. It just wasn't fair to anyone and Nao personally thought that if someone was going to make her feel so at odds with the rest of the natural order of things, that they should perhaps invest in a better way of doing it then making her try and get herself killed by Fujino or fall in love with Kuga.

They were both unattainable goals, and both of them were completely fucking stupid.

She had kissed Kuga. Blown what little cover she'd managed to maintain for herself, even if Kuga was dumb as a brick most of the time. Still, it was rather poetic, the way that Kuga never seemed to notice the way that others feel about her. Nao frowned, she shouldn't be doing this.

It was her fucking death wish.

She wished for a cigarette, but Kuga had quit years ago and so she wasn't allowed to smoke around her for fear that Kuga fall back into the bad habit. Still, even Kuga had to admit that cigarettes would make the whole situation better - at least on some level.

She'd let Kuga walk ahead of her when they walked slowly down the hall towards the door to Kuga's apartment. Nao had no idea what would happen once they opened that door, but she guessed that she'd be safe for a few minutes, at least, because Kuga was hurt and Fujino was bound to care about that far more than the awkwardness of Nao and Kuga's interactions at the moment.

Natsuki would not look at her.

Nao clenched her fists and kept her eyes on the floor, making sure that Kuga did not drip any blood onto the floor. It would be hard for them to explain to the building management why Kuga and Fujino were dripping blood all over the hallway. Nao knew that they could lose their apartment for something like that, on top of the fact that they always walked on a tentative line when it came to places to live because of the 'unnaturalness' of their relationship.

"Are you going to say anything?" Nao asked. She really hoped that Kuga would not, but it was not really her call any more. Nao knew that Kuga was almost always honest with Fujino about the rather comical romantic advances of her male coworkers - the new breed of foolish Takedas who had no idea just who it was that they were messing with. Kuga told Fujino to prevent the inevitable discovery of the love letters that Kuga always kept as records of who'd grown interested in her and when. It was her way to prevent people from getting killed by that crazy bitch.

It really did make sense, for Fujino was far more likely than any of the HiME to spiral back down into the madness of the carnival, in Nao's humble opinion.

"Not unless you give me reason to." Kuga shot back. She sounded better than she had just moments before, on the motorcycle. Nao guessed that it had something to do with Fujino's proximity as well, and she struggled to push all the negative feelings that well up inside her back down to wherever it was that they came from. She hated the fact that she could not control her emotions when they were in such a state of conflict - after she'd done something exceptionally stupid.

Nao steeled her expression into something that could be called a scowl or a sneer, depending on how well the observer knew her, and helped Kuga to open the door. They had to be quiet, on the off-chance that Fujino had gone to sleep, but with the sudden departure of Kikukawa and the lights on within the apartment, the chances of that being the case were slim.

"Natsuki?" Fujino's voice came from the kitchen. There was a clatter of cutlery and Fujino appeared, silhouetted in the light streaming into the darkened hallway; Kuga had not had the strength, it seemed, to reach up and flick on the light switch. Still, the sudden appearance of Fujino made Nao's blood run cold as she hurriedly tried to figure out exactly why she was still there. She knew, on a purely animal level, that she should run – get the fuck out of there before Fujino put two and two together; but that same sick feeling of sadism or whatever it was made Nao calmly nod at Fujino and begin to shed her outer layer of clothing.

Nao took a step away from Kuga and began to remove her shoes as Fujino surged forward to gather Kuga up in her arms and demand to know exactly what had happened. Nao again felt the anger rise up within her, but this time it was squashed by a growing sense of dread as Kuga calmly explained what had happened in the battle - how they'd been ambushed and how she'd gotten that hunk of wood jammed into her arm.

"Really, I'm fine." Kuga was saying as Nao righted herself after untying her boots and pulling them off. "Look, I just want to take a shower and go to bed. I'll be alright in the morning - Jun won't even have to know."

Fujino helped Kuga to her feet and sent her on her way towards the apartment's lone bathroom. Nao was about to pad off into the kitchen for a finger or two of scotch or something stronger if Kuga had it when Fujino's voice cut through the awkward hush that had fallen as soon as Kuga had closed the bathroom door firmly behind her. Nao could see nothing of anguish or fear in Fujino's eyes in this dim light, only a sinister reddish glow that she had never remembered before.

"What?" Nao demanded. She folded her arms around her and realized that her own shirt was far more ripped than he'd originally remembered. Cursing, she pulled it around and frowned at it; it had been a very expensive article of clothing, and she hated to lose it to an orphan of all things.

"She's being evasive, Yuuki, something else happened." Fujino announced. She tsked at Nao's shirt as she swept past the redhead and into the kitchen. "Are you going to be consuming more of our liquor?"

_That _was far too civil on Fujino's part for Nao to feel entirely comfortable with, but she wasn't going to turn down a chance for some free booze to dull the pain in her strained muscles and make her mind stop racing quite so fast. Nao shrugged, "I could use it." She shuddered to think about the outcome of that battle, if she'd messed up. Kuga thought that she was just foolhardy, but Nao was very quickly coming to the realization that if she did something wrong, she would end both her own live and the life of this happy family that she'd grown to accept as her own, in an odd sort of way. God only knew that Kuga was the only person who really gave a damn about her, and Fujino had grudgingly started to accept that her presence was rather inevitable in the big scheme of things.

"What isn't she saying?" Fujino asked thoughtfully, rummaging in a cabinet above the refrigerator for the small collection of alcohol that they kept for entertaining and the occasional need for both of them to occasionally binge drink themselves into oblivion. Fujino unearthed a dusty bottle from the back of the cabinet and stepped back. "Why wasn't she being honest with me?"

Nao accepted the drink she poured and downed it in two long swigs.

Fuck, she still couldn't believe she'd done that.

"I've no idea. It was a fairly run-of-the-mill meet the enemy and have them taunt you," Nao shrugged. "If it makes you feel any better, the enemy called me a whore."

Fujino snorted in a most un-Fujino-like way. Nao could tell that she'd succeeded in breaking the ice that had started to form over the room with Kuga's absence.

"Look, Fujino-" Nao began, picking her words carefully. "I've gotta call a cab and get out of here - you're all going to bed soon and I don't want to impose." She knew that guilting a place to sleep tonight was her best bet at getting another chance to finally discuss with Kuga the stupid thing she'd done only minutes before. Not to mention the fact that the trains had stopped running an hour ago and she didn't really want to have to foot the bill for a taxi across town.

"If that is what you want, by all means go, but Natsuki would never forgive me if I let you go back into the city and you got attacked by another orphan." Shizuru looked scornful for a moment, before the expression faded off of her face. The late hour must have been affecting the way that Fujino usually acted around Nao, for this was the most civil conversation that they'd had since before the carnival, fifteen years ago.

_If I got attacked_, Nao thought bitterly, _you would not be around to be killed by Natsuki. No, none of us would. _

Nao cursed herself for accidentally binding herself into this insane chain of reciprocated and unrequited love - just her luck, really.

"What? Are you offering the couch?" Nao laughed. She stood and took her glass over to the sink and rinsed it out before setting it into the dish drain. She turned to face Fujino with a slight flourish of her hair and the ripped portion of her shirt.

"Only if you wash." Fujino said, "You reek of orphan."

* * *

Natsuki awoke the following morning to the sounds of Jun playing her old Xbox loudly from the living room. She really wished that he would keep it down a little, as some people were injured and needed to sleep. She rolled over to find a cold void in the mattress where Shizuru had slept only moments before. Jun must have woken her up, Natsuki reasoned. She propped herself up as best she could on one arm and gingerly felt the soreness on her upper arm. She was healing, which was good, but the soreness meant that she would have to be careful around Jun today, to make sure that she didn't accidentally hurt herself roughhousing with the young boy.

She frowned, wondering what Shizuru had planned for them to do during the day. Usually Sundays were their day to go and get groceries - but their refrigerator was so small and constantly full of leftovers from Shizuru's morningly forays into the realm of lunch boxes for herself and the rest of her family that Natsuki wondered if there was going to be enough room for any grocery shopping at the moment.

Her thoughts turned towards the troubling confession that Nao had made the previous evening. She couldn't believe that Nao could have been so foolish to do something like that, in the apartment building. In the battlefield or on one of their many innocuous lunchtime 'dates' that seemed to cause more trouble then they helped would be a far better place for such behavior. Natsuki shook her head. She didn't want to think about it. Nao could have her own death wish, and it did explain why Nao's powers suddenly returned.

Natsuki realized that she was the only really important person in Nao's life. It had been that way for nearly fifteen years.

_I wonder why I didn't see it... _

Tiredly, Natsuki made her way down the hallway to the bathroom, opening the door and sleepily making her way towards the toilet.

"Oi! Kuga!" Nao's voice cut through Natsuki's sleepy haze and she jerked backwards to see Nao with _her_ toothbrush crammed into her mouth and a pair of sweats that Natsuki could have _sworn_ had once belonged to her covering most of the redhead's body.

"That's my toothbrush!" Natsuki's anguished cry filled the room and soon Jun's feet came padding down the hallway to witness Nao grin wolfishly at Natsuki and then go back to brushing her teeth with vigor.

Natsuki clenched her fist and stalked around her son and towards the kitchen. She sat down at the kitchen table and announced, "She's using my toothbrush. Has she no taste or tact?"

"Yuuki?" Shizuru looked up thoughtfully from the newspaper, "probably not."


	20. Chapter 20

**Passages, Chapter Twenty  
**

_AN - Wow, I never believed that I'd get to chapter twenty and have no clear end in sight. This is rather silly, even for me. I should find a plot, soon. _

_ Oh, look...  
_

* * *

_Before Midori departed for _ _America__, she left a box of her notes that she'd gathered during the carnival with me. She said, at the time, that I should keep them safe, because she didn't think that the Carnival would ever really come to an end. I called her foolish then, and I still do it now. There is no reason that this hell that I lived in for more than ten years needs to be perpetuated even further, but Midori's one of those obsessive types who thinks that nothing is over until something explodes rather fantastically. Apparently the near devastation of half of Fuuka or the destruction of that bridge when Searrs attacked was not enough for her. What a fool. _

_I kept the notes, however, and Shizuru and I had many a night sitting up and reading them, curious as to their contents. Shizuru's curiosity was far more clinical than my own, and she wanted to know everything about the supposed mythos of Ikusahime and the legends of the twelve maidens, where as I was completely okay with simply skimming the history and taking in what I thought to be important. Like that page of neatly written notes that Midori had left detailing exactly why she didn't think the carnival could possibly be over with just the battle that we'd already fought. _

_I really wonder about her some times, but she's got a good head on her shoulders most of the time, and its rare that Midori is wrong. _

_I don't want there to be more of this, I don't want to have to deal with fighting more battles and coping with the fact that I can never really feel safe again with Shizuru's life constantly in the balance. It's just not a way of life that I can accept, and I do not intend to apply any of the logic that Midori is so insistent upon using in every day life. _

_Perhaps one day, I'll finally figure out what exactly it is that I want from life, for I am never happy when I'm not fighting against some invisible foe. And yet, I do not want to fight any more. I can't stand the idea of losing Shizuru to a battle or my own foolish actions somehow precipitating her death. _

_I think that all the HiME still worry about it, for our most precious person is the only one who'd vanish if we died. I can just see it now, years in the future, when someone fades into nothingness because of a cancer or a heart attack. It would be a fitting end to the HiME legacy, and one that not even Midori would have predicted. _

_I took the notes and hid them away in an American safety deposit box in the local branch of the local American embassy; I'll add this journal to the bunch when I finish the final few pages that I've got to fill out. I don't really know why I decided to put them there, rather than a Swiss account or something untraceable in one of those little islands off of the coast of South America, I think that the fact that Midori was in the states at the time had something to do with it. I figure that if Midori needs to access the accounts for any reason, it'd be better if she didn't have to go through a third party within the United States, I hear that their banking system is absolute murder._

* * *

Five years later.

The journal fell to the ground, but the figure in white who'd been perusing its contents made no effort to pick it up. She had no need to, nor had any real interest in reading the contents of the manuscript yet again, for the information already been read and digested several times. This read through was simply for amusement's sake. She'd spent a good long while laughing at how foolishly naive young Kuga had been, making a choice to simply back away her carefully chronicled past like that. She'd clearly illustrated the HiME's weakness, making it far too easy for her forces to slowly begin their assault on the HiME. A true HiME would never leave herself open as Kuga had, mistaking the security of the lull that followed the first carnival to represent the end of a HiME's duty.

It almost didn't make sense, as Kuga was one of the best, the most efficient HiME that existed in the current bunch. She was not overly ruled by her emotions as Tokiha and some of the others were, and she definitely had a better head on her shoulders than most of them.

Yet she'd chosen to write down her every weakness. The figure in white could simply not understand why Kuga had done something so stupidly innocent and suspected that she would actually be able to get away with it.

Others knew better, others were constantly reverent of their abilities and vigilant for any change that might suggest that they would be once again called into battle.

Kuga was foolish and chose not to believe.

_It is always the fool that brings the lord's downfall_, the old saying went. The reader stood and plucked the book from the floor, a smirk crossing her face in the darkness. She had much to be happy about today, but she knew that she should not take her happiness in too soon, for it was with hasty steps that mistakes were made.

For now, she would go on playing the part of the little girl all in white, completely oblivious to what was happening around her. _Maybe no longer a little girl,_ she mused, looking down at herself with a widening smile. She could get anything she wanted in this world, except the one thing she truly wanted - the one that she'd wanted since her childhood.

A little girl clad in white, a tall slender woman, her face still clinging to a youthful roundness. She raised her hands to touch her face, thinking of the happy family that she'd seen pictured in Kuga's house, in the photos spread around that office. They were all happy, starting families of their own.

Didn't they know that they should wait to start their families?

Didn't they know that she'd yet to have the final say?

An image of a red-headed half-Japanese girl and a beautiful baby in her arms flashed through her mind, and she dropped to her knees, her eyes narrowing. "Disappear," she muttered. Her voice grew in momentum as the darkness; the hidden evil that slept within her slowly pushed its way to the surface once more and cut through her consciousness. She had had no way of controlling it then, and it certainly was not going away now. "Disappear!"

* * *

"When we were younger, do you remember when I started to write things down, Shizuru?" Natsuki spun her spoon in the tea in front of her. It was already well-blended (Shizuru was very good at that sort of thing), but it gave her something to do besides scrutinize Shizuru's face. That particular visage was being very difficult for Natsuki to read today, and even though her arm was still aching from the wound she'd sustained a few days ago, Natsuki could think of nothing else to do but spend the evening watching Shizuru to see if she'd figured it out yet. Natsuki was terrified of that confrontation and had been dreading the inevitable moment when Shizuru finally felt compelled to ask the question that had been floating just below the surfaces of their minds since Nao's sudden discovery that she could materialize protons once again. They hadn't talked about Nao's most important person, per say, but Natsuki knew that it was only a matter of time before Mai or one of the others asked where Nao was finding all of this strength that she'd never had in the past.

"Yes, and I recall trying to talk you out of it many times," Shizuru responded with a gentle smile. Natsuki knew that Shizuru had far more to hide than she ever would, and was naturally a lot more paranoid than Natsuki. She'd seen the journals as a step by step guide to bring down the seemingly unbreakable image of Fujino Shizuru that they'd striven to create over the years.

To make matters almost seen worse, they had Jun to worry about as well; for he was getting to the age when he went exploring within their apartment and unearthed all sorts of old skeletons in their closets that Natsuki and Shizuru would much rather have kept to themselves. Jun was a well full of questions that Natsuki never wanted to think about ever again - they didn't know what to tell the boy, for lying was not an option. They painted a story about a very bad time in their joint history, and how both of them had been caught in the middle of it all. They would have to tell him the truth at some point, but for now it was better that he just didn't question their motives for keeping their stony silence.

Natsuki laughed. "I needed to do it though; it was how I finally worked through all of that crap."

"Yes, after sitting on it and being angry for nearly ten years." Shizuru added. She looked thoughtful for a moment, and Natsuki tried to peer though her closed-off expression and figure out what it was that her lover was thinking. It was so hard, sometimes, to figure it out. Shizuru was tapping her chin, which usually meant that she was keeping her hand close to her mouth in case she had to hide a smile behind it. "I'm shocked that no one killed you."

Natsuki tipped her chair back. She understood Shizuru's comment well, as she had been rather unbearable throughout all of those ten long years. "Still, I want to make sure that they're still where I left them - with all the recent events and the enemy's familiarity with us - I feel as though I should move them before the enemy figures out that I've got this whole tome of HiME knowledge stowed away in a safety deposit box."

_If they don't have it all ready. _The words went unspoken between the two of them, but Natsuki could sense the confusion in the thoughts. It was probably nothing; they didn't have anything to worry about. Natsuki wanted to make sure that there was no way such a blatant weakness was found by their enemies. It was her own foolishness that had perpetuated the existence of those documents in the first place, when she should have burned them years ago.

Shizuru's face fell back into thoughtfulness once more and she almost seemed to completely remove herself from the room as she sat in silence. Natsuki had always been jealous of that ability, she'd always wanted to have the ability to carefully remove herself from a situation by zoning out so completely - it would come in handy at work.

Natsuki turned her attention back to her tea, and shifting as subtly as she could in her chair, for her very expensive underwear was starting to ride up her ass in such a way that no pair of expensive underwear should. It was truly not amusing, but if she fixed it any other way, Shizuru would have something to say about it, and Natsuki was pretty sure that she'd spend the next few minutes shouting at her. Natsuki did not like it when their interactions came to that.

"Who do you think Nao's most important person is, Natsuki?" Natsuki flinched, and she knew that the action was visible. She didn't know how to prevent it, and it was the action that betrayed her in the first place. Shizuru's eyes narrowed and Natsuki knew that she had very little time to avert disaster.

She took a deep breath, and tried not to meet Shizuru in the eyes. While it was not her betrayal, it felt like one all the same - and something that Natsuki had sworn long ago that she would never ever do again. She could not turn her back on them, and Nao was rather forcing her hand in a way that was just a little ridiculous. "I know who it is," she admitted. "Nao told me last night."

"Don't tell me." Shizuru's voice had gone cold and harsh, but there was nothing really that Natsuki could do to prevent Shizuru's anger. It wasn't her fault. Shizuru had guessed it, after all. Natsuki supposed that it was inevitable.

"She said that the only logical conclusion she could come to was that it was me." Natsuki explained, trying her best to keep her tone even.

"You?" Shizuru arched an eyebrow, her tone adding very clearly, 'you're taken'.

"Yes, me." Natsuki responded.

"Did she happen to say why?" Shizuru asked.

"No. What's it to you, anyway?" Natsuki wanted Shizuru to admit that she was, perhaps, in the wrong here. Explaining her motives went a long way in getting Shizuru to slow down, just a little bit, and actually think her actions through.

_And they say that I'm the headstrong, reckless type. _

"I'd like to weigh the probability of your disappearing against my extreme urge to hurt Yuuki badly." Shizuru explained with the air of someone commenting on the weather.

Natsuki abruptly pushed her chair back from the table and stood up hurriedly. Her chair clattered to the floor behind her and the sudden silence from the other room told her that Jun had turned down the volume on his movie to hear what was going on in the kitchen. She narrowed her eyes and scowled at Shizuru's blankly smiling face. "You will do no such thing," she hissed. The hair on the back of her neck was standing up on end and she was getting ready to launch into a really nasty fight if she had to.

She was prepared to die, yet again, because of Shizuru's foolish quarrel with Nao.

She could not let this get out of hand.

"Natsuki has no right to restrict me." Shizuru pointed out, standing up as well and carefully pushing her chair back in towards the table.

"I have a right to tell you that I love you and that I could never love her, not in a million years." Natsuki's breath caught. They'd had this conversation so many times, in so many incarnations now that the words were starting to grow old and worn down with the repetition. "Nao isn't even attracted to me, I just happen to be meaningful in her life." She was lying, but she had to keep Shizuru from going to a war path - or they would all vanish into nothingness. "I matter to her, she cares what I think."

Shizuru was silent for a while.

"It's rather like you and I, really, before the carnival. Just a meaningful friendship."

Natsuki didn't know who exactly she was trying to convince now.

* * *

Kanzaki Reito sat moodily in front of his canvas, trying to figure out just what exactly he wanted to paint today. He usually had no trouble finding inspiration, for he often simply referred back to one of the numerous sketches he'd made on the day that Fujino had allowed him to come and talk about art to his students. He'd sat in their playground during their lunch period and had sketched for the full hour - composing and laying the groundwork for many of his works for the next several months. But painting children and happiness simply wasn't working for him right now. He wanted something more representative to the state of panic of his sister - of Mai - of all those whom he held dear to his heart.

He stabbed his brush into the black glob of gauche he'd squeezed out of the tube onto his makeshift palate, adding in a little red and blue, creating a midnight black canvas that could be called a deep purple if looked at in the correct light. He drew in the star that Mikoto had described to him many times, a great hulking mass that looked a lot like the HiME mark, a twisted perversion of that mark that had graced his sister's shoulder for as long as he could remember. He didn't know why he was painting this scene, but he allowed his emotions to freely float as he did so, his eyes closed.

He painted long into the night, something he had not done since college - and fell asleep at his table. The canvas was waiting for him in the morning, and as the pale wintry dawn broke Reito woke to stare at what he'd created.

He'd never done something like this before, completely removed himself, his personality and everything recognizable as _him_ from a painting before. This was something different, something alien to his very nature. He had no idea from what darkness within him this picture had come. This grisly scene that looked like something out of a nightmare – a perfect companion to the spirit of his sister and their group of friends who still really remembered what had happened at Fuuka, fifteen years ago.

The automatic coffee machine whirred into life as he stared at what he'd painted.

Reito made his way over to his bed, and fumbled clumsily though the clothes that he'd cast off the night before, desperately searching for his cell phone. Someone, any of the HiME really, needed to see this. He couldn't tell them how exactly he'd managed to create something so horrible, but maybe they'd be able to tell him what it meant. With a triumphant shout, he unearthed his phone out of his pants pocket and quickly dialed Mikoto's number. She had to see this, maybe she could help him understand.


	21. Chapter 21

**Passages, Chapter Twenty-One  
**

_AN - Something I've found interesting in the past few days of browsing around the fics up here: Why is it that every fic I read seems to break the fourth wall in one way or another? The Fourth Wall, for those of you who don't know, is a film term that basically describes the final separation between fiction and reality that many movies try to suspend. While most of the fics that I've been reading have done a good job at keeping fiction and reality separate, there are few wonderfully wonderful concepts that I cannot read because of the constant bombardment of the Fourth Wall. No, Natsuki should not listen to Kajiura Yuki or have Ensei as her cell phone ring tone. No, the characters in your story should not be reading your other fics (often times about them) in the guise of novels. It's just in poor taste and authors shouldn't do it. And also: No, characters cannot get into Toudai (Tokyo University) without trying. It's like getting into Harvard without trying, multiplied by ABOUT A MILLION. God guys, do your research. _

_Seriously, don't do it. It's nearly as bad as Americanizing the entire show through fanfic. But that just makes me capslock. WITH RAGE AND FOR GREAT JUSTICE. anyone got anything to say on this? _

The Chase_ and _Windows of the Soul_ are both quite good..._

* * *

_I bought a new journal today when I was waiting at the station to catch the connecter train into work. I don't really know why I did it, or why I'm writing in it now, but something that Shizuru said last night really sort of rings true for me. I do need to write things down to truly understand them. My old notebooks are locked far away from me, so I cannot go back and reread my thoughts from five, or maybe even ten years ago. The Carnival is lost on me to the abyss of time and memory, those old pages of my thoughts and feelings are my only tie to those painful years. I cannot remember everything that happened during that painful time, and yet I know that I must. I'm afraid of what might happen to me, now that the situation has worsened so much. It's only a matter of time before Shizuru and Nao actually come into direct conflict. I don't know how I'm going to play the middle man when I'm so clearly on Shizuru's side for this. Nao fucked up, and I know that she knows it._

_But why does she continue to act so much like a damn fool? It's not my fault that I've been kind to her, she's so much like me that I can't help but make sure that I take care of her - I don't want her strung out on the streets like she very easily could have been, had I not been taking care of her. She's got a job, a good secure one at that, everything that a person could want out of the Japanese job market. _

_In __Japan__, I guess that we think that financial stability is a good way to measure happiness, when it is only a real measure of success. I do it all the time, and even when I know that success does not always make people happy, I feel compelled to impress that value on others. We're worthless at love and feelings collectively as a nation, and I've spent my whole life trying to combat the feeling that I will never succeed at representing my feelings to anyone again. Shizuru is my only confident, the only one whom I really feel for on any level._

_I love Jun, and to some extent I suppose that Mai and Nao are important to me on some level - but no one can come close to the love I feel for Shizuru. She is my world, my everything; I could never do anything to hurt her._

_She's hurting now, however. I messed this up by telling her the truth. I should have known better, that nothing good could ever come out of what Nao said. Nao's a fool for love, one of the worst kinds of fool that exists, and I can do nothing to fix her. If it were drugs, I could put her into rehab, if it were too much sex; I could take care her and make sure she recovered. I just... can't fix this. _

_I feel as though she deserves what she's brought upon herself, for the misery is entirely of her own creation. She's a strong character, a strong personality, and she thinks she can get away with such crazy bullshit as falling in love with me at now of all times. Fucking insane._

_Shizuru and I left on the same train to work today, we rode side by side until we reached the central station where she had to take the northbound and I the south. She held my hand and tried as best she could to look as though she was not falling apart inside. I can see it very well; I'm used to it after all of these years. It's the one emotion on Shizuru's face that I can read well without problems. I know her emotional turmoil like the back of my hand. She doesn't' know how to hide her fears from me, even though I sometimes lead her to believe that I don't always understand what she's thinking. I've never had any trouble with her self-loathing._

_I can see the twitch in her eye even now, haunting my memories from when Suzushiro first struck all those years ago. That moment haunts my memories, making it impossible for me to sleep on some nights._

_I need to be strong for her, I need to be so many things, but I'm so torn._

_Shizuru is my most important person, and yet my guns came out to save Nao from almost certain death. The terror of that moment is still so fresh in my brain; I don't even know what I was thinking about, just that I had to, desperately, save Nao. _

_Nao has been a constant thorn in my side since the beginning of my time at Fuuka. She saw herself in me, when I wanted nothing to do with her conniving nature that seemed to take my acquaintances and pit them against me. It's like the enemy now, taking the worst of us and using it against us. We can't stop being vigilant. _

_It's so messed up, this whole thing. I never believed in a million years that I would be stuck having to fight for everything I loved once again, that I might have to die once again. _

_Somehow I have the feeling that this time we will not get the same easy 'get out of jail free' from the abyss of death. Kazehana died for us last time and Himeno has never been the same since. _

_We're bringing a new age into being, an age when the HiME are no longer warriors in a struggle for superiority, but in a struggle to stay alive._

* * *

_Seven Hours Later._

Kanzaki Reito had spent much of the day frantically calling both his sister and Tokiha Mai. Tate, Mai, rather. He frowned as he corrected himself for what felt like the fifth time that day. He really needed to stop thinking of Mai as some sort of obtainable object, for she wasn't. Not any more.

In college, he'd still held onto the hope that Mai would come to her senses and decide that she didn't' want to be with Tate Yuuichi any more. He knew that it had been a foolish hope, but one that he'd clung too desperately because he knew that it was the only thing that kept him going for days and days on end.

He'd taken care of Mikoto for so many years, after the carnival, that it was shocking how quickly that his little sister, the memories of her so newly returned to him at first, had grown to be such an integral part of his life. Reito was no longer just the aloof upperclassman who seemed to have nothing better to do with his time than follow the younger students around. For a while, he and Fujino Shizuru had spread rumors of their illicit affair, just for kicks, around Fuuka campus just because they were bored and it had been amusing at the time. But once Kuga Natsuki had come into the picture, even that venue of his entertainment was taken away from him. Fujino had her own life, her own friends, and he was no longer a part of that circle.

Still, he clung to Mai because of her friendship with Mikoto - and because she was the one who had taken over his role in Mikoto's life. Tokiha had stolen his sister from him, in a sense. At the same time that it angered him, Reito knew that he could never be angry at Mai again - she had saved him after all.

Saved him from doing horrible, unspeakable things to his sister - for that was what the Obsidian Lord did to his chosen maiden. He couldn't believe that he had even considered allowing Mikoto win that blasted carnival - as it was just a suicide mission for him. He would rather die than let that alter-ego; the one who he was positive had had something to do with his altered consciousness while he painted the night before – do anything to his adorable and innocent sister. He was her brother and he'd failed at protecting her when she'd needed protection the most. Now, the Obsidian Lord was never far away, but as the HiME rose into a panic over this latest foe, he felt no cause to help them, or to fight for them.

It had nothing to do with him - and he had no reason to get involved. The accursed HiME had to deal with this situation on their own. The Obsidian Lord's opinion tended to outweigh Reito's own most of time, because Reito had grown used to the entity's presence after so many years of living together with him. He supposed that he was just accustomed to taking second place to whatever the Obsidian Lord actually was. And entity? Maybe, but Reito wasn't really sure that you could classify something like Obsidian Lord at all; there were no words to describe it.

A quiet knock on the door jerked the entity that sometimes occupied Kanzaki Reito's subconscious to retreat back into the hidden depths of his mind - allowing the far more mild-mannered man who usually was allowed to rule this body to come forward and control his own body once again. It could bide its time until the moment to finally strike would come. He would have his HiME, his princess.

Mai-HiME.

Reito pulled a button-up shirt on over his paint-spattered tee and moved through the general clutter of his apartment's floor. He knew that he should clean and keep his workspace tidy for all the potential buyers of his paintings to see that he was actually a decent individual - and not strung out on drugs like many of his counterparts. At the same time, however, he really didn't want to, he liked his clutter, for it helped him to focus in a way that not many artists could. He drew from deep within himself for his paintings, sold to schools and hospitals all over Japan. Happy children, happy girls and boys without a care in the world.

Not like what he'd just painted - that was something all together different, all together evil.

_Something out of the Obsidian Lord's own subconscious. _

He opened the door and greeted his younger sister with a smile, accepting the small packet of food from Mai's restaurant that she'd brought with her. Mai was a mother-hen; she loved to feed everyone and took pride in how well she took care of her friends. Reito was glad, because he hadn't sold a painting in weeks and he was getting ready to make the choice between eating this week and paying the rent. As always, he would pick the rent, but with Mai's food, which he could stretch for days on end, he didn't have to worry about where he could find a free meal.

"Mikoto, hi." He said, stepping back and allowing her into the apartment. He could already see the curiosity on her young face, wondering what he could have possibly needed her for.

Mikoto was still, in many ways, a child. She'd grown up over the years quite well, moving away from the child-like state that she'd been in during the carnival, maturing into a young woman who was both confident and skilled in her chosen field. Still, Reito knew that she'd been kept that way for a reason, so that she could be controlled and manipulated into winning the carnival in the first place.

He felt the Obsidian Lord's anger within him, for it was always the Kagutsuchi users that ruined the plans - and Tokiha Mai had thrown a spectacular wrench into the works when she'd shown up at Fuuka and changed the balance of the battle for good.

"Hello," Mikoto's tone was serious as she moved towards the painting, propped up against the paint splattered wall. Reito cursed quietly, he hadn't noticed what he'd done to the walls the night before - now he was going to have to lose his deposit on the apartment to fix it. He frowned, and moved to stand next to his sister. "So this is it, huh?" She asked, putting her hands on her hips.

"I went into some sort of trance." Reito said, gesturing at the painting. "I've never done anything like this before."

Mikoto looked suddenly fearful, "Do you think it was him?"

Reito knew that she was referring to the evil that resided within him, and he knew that he should be honest with his sister - that he'd co-existed with the entity for his entire life and its presence didn't even bother him any more. He didn't know why he kept that information to himself, but he guessed that it was because he knew his sister, and he knew that she would not react well if she found out. He shrugged in the most exaggerated gesture he could, and shook his head, "I've no idea."

Mikoto fixed him and then the painting with one of her more intense gazes and frowned. "I don't know what you were painting, but it looks pretty grisly if that's our fates."

She gestured to the still-drying mutilated forms that filled the bottom of the painting, her mouth slightly open. Reito too looked at the mutilated bodies that he'd painted with the precision of one of the early horror artists in Europe's fifteenth century. This wasn't what he painted - he drew his inspiration from Americans like Norman Rockwell - not something horrible like this. Reito drew a deep breath, and then another one. He was afraid, for some reason, that the entity within him was trying to tell the HiME something, and that the message was being received, loud and clear.

"I don't think that this is your fates," Reito said quietly.

"How do you know, Ani-Ue?" Mikoto demanded. She rounded on him and jabbed a finger into his chest. While she'd grown taller over the years, Reito could still easily tower over her, but somehow he found himself cowering in her presence. He'd been lying to her for years, and it was starting to grow harder for him to keep his mouth shut against the potential slew of secrets that he was bound to spill out at some point in time. "How do you know that he's not somewhere inside of you, messing with you - with all of us?"

Reito closed his eyes, "I don't, Mikoto." He hated this painting, hated everything it stood for. The lie was something that he had to perpetuate if he wanted to stay alive. The Obsidian Lord could so easily decide that Reito was no longer a suitable vestal for him, and then Reito would be stuck to find his own way in the world for the first time ever.

He'd been living a lie for so long that he didn't think that he could handle that. It just didn't work for him, and the Obsidian Lord, to some extent, seemed to be willing to help the HiME out with this particular problem - he knew when he was defeated.

"There's nothing we can do but wait." Reito continued. "I want to destroy this painting."

"Don't -" Mikoto grabbed his arm. "Don't, Reito. Keep it so that when we win, we can prove that we defeated the Obsidian Lord's hell."

"He has been dead for years, Mikoto." Reito protested. He bit his tongue as he lied, but he could not think of another way to put the statement. "He's not still haunting out steps."

They'd kept him in the loop because he was Mikoto's brother, and already so deeply connected to the HiME's cause - it just didn't make sense for him to be lying any more, yet he still did it.

He was a coward.

"I don't know, Ani-ue, I just don't know any more."

Reito didn't think that he'd ever heard Mikoto sound so helpless.

* * *

The door to the restaurant was locked, so Yuuki Nao let herself in with the ease of a long-practicing criminal who had the bonus advantage of an element to deal with pesky locks. She loved the fact that her elements were back once more, and that Julia was there if she ever needed companionship – it was good to not feel as alone at night.

Even after all of her fights with herself, however, Nao was resolute in what she was doing now. She wanted to talk to Mai, and the damned woman was not answering her phone. Nao had spent a lot of time with both Mai and Kuga over the years, and she knew Mai's schedule quite well. She wasn't sleeping, so she was most likely lost in her own world in the back room, tinkering with some recipe.

"Hello?" Nao called. She peered through the dusty blackness of the restaurant, looking through shadows transected by beams of weak November sunlight; looking for signs of life. She saw nothing, just the remnants of a restaurant that had been closed since the night before. Nothing moved and nothing was out of place. "Mai?" She tried again.

Still nothing.

_It's not like her to not answer. Bad form, Tokiha, bad form, not greeting your guests. _Nao felt a little guilty standing in a room that should have been locked looking for someone who might not want to be found at the moment. _Even if the guest broke in, you should still want to say hello._

Nao knew that Mai would understand her plight - that she'd understand the situation. Mai, too, had been torn over why her most important person was who he was. She would, perhaps, understand why Nao was so desperate to make sure that she did not get caught in the tangled web of Fujino and Kuga's bizarre love for each other. She wanted nothing to do with it, and yet she desperately needed to be around Kuga. To prove that she was not as useless as Kuga seemed to think she was.

She was no fool, after all.

"Mai?" She called one more time into the darkness, confusion growing on her face. There was no way that Mai would vanish like that.

Something was wrong.

The gentle crying of a baby from the floor above jerked Nao from her thoughts. "Arisa." She said quietly, walking through the rooms towards the back of the building. The lights were off and the growing dusk told Nao that soon the kitchen and wait staff would be arriving and that she would have to get out of here soon. Still, she had to make sure that the baby was taken care of.

Mai would not leave her child like this.

"Fuck, Tokiha, where did you go?"

What the hell was going on?


	22. Chapter 22

**Passages, Chapter Twenty-Two  
**

_AN - Alright, the major scene in this chapter is taken from a piece of Sunagimo's fanart of Reito and Shizuru. I have a whole collection of art that I want to somehow put into this story - the idea of Nao in red and black stripes comes from a great Mutto! fanart that I found while trolling the internets. _

_So, who's watched S.ifl yet? I have to say that it was really quite fantastic, and I can't wait for the subs._

_Sorry that my last author's note caused so much controversy, but I really do feel that stories should be well researched before they are written. Well-thought-out, not so much, because I love writing half-baked ideas, it makes for gooey centres._

_Also: I've been trying to 'age' the HiME characters in a way that makes some sort of sense. I've put a great deal of thought into who would be working in what field, and how their lives would have progressed - but at the same time, I can't seem to mentally picture the characters aged. I mean, we _know_ what Shizuru, Natsuki and Mai looked like as they were 'aged' for Otome, but at the same time, I can't picture if Nao would have let her hair grow as some of the fanart seems to depict, or simply keep her own style. I suppose that it's my own folly for falling into this fanfiction trap, but does anyone have any ideas as to how to age the characters?  
_

* * *

_Mai's still gone. Vanished into the blackness, as it were. That is, if your definition of blackness involves __Japan__ and a general lack of it ever really being truly dark in this city. No one knows where she could have gotten to and tempers are running very high as we try to puzzle it out. No one can really put a finger on when Mai disappeared, and now, despite my best efforts to the contrary, the police have gotten involved. Tate called them, even though it would be better if they did not get involved until we'd exhausted all of our other means to looking for Mai first; but Mai is his wife, and he desperately wants her back._

_More than anything, I wanted to avoid interacting with the authorities. It's a purely selfish concern, as I know that my name is still flagged to give my father alerts as to my activities, especially if the police are involved. I haven't spoken to him in years, and nor to I intend to. He left my life long ago when he decided that I was not worth his time or his efforts - dumping me into the already failing Japanese foster care system. I've lived my life without him, and the last thing I want is his interfering with my life now that I've finally made one for myself. _

_The presence of the authorities in this investigation, and the fact that Nao had the audacity to break into the restaurant to discover Mai missing in the first place are making it very hard for me to put my head around the fact that police presence around me could very easily lose me my job. As it is, I'm walking on broken glass around the higher-ups at the companies, and the police going around asking questions about me - trying to determine if I would have the motive to kidnap one of my closest friends - is really more than enough ground to fire me. It's so selfish of me to be caring about something as trivial as my own employment at a time like this, but I can't help thinking about it._

_I refuse to think of Mai, and for the past week, I've pushed her as far out of my head as I can manage without pretending that she doesn't exist entirely. It's a foolish thing to do, but I cannot - perhaps I won't even - allow myself to put my head around what could have possibly happened to her._

_I'm scared for her - what happened to her? The police say that there are no signs of a struggle, and I know that Tate doesn't have any idea what's happened to her. He's so lost, as is Mikoto. I've seen Mai at her absolute worst, Mikoto too, but this is nothing. It's like there's an absence in all of our lives that suddenly is forcing us to finally understand exactly what Mai meant to all of us. It is almost like losing my mother all over again._

_It's almost typical, really, that as soon as Mai vanishes off the face of the earth - as far as I can tell - that one of the last people that I'd ever expected to see again makes his grand return into our lives. Kanzaki Reito has no place in this battle, but in Mai's sudden absence, Mikoto has gone running back to her 'Ani-ue' as though Mai never existed. I hate that man; I can't stand to even look at him. He's such a relic, really, a representation of a much more complicated time in my life that I cannot stand seeing him when life has finally started to even out for me. _

_Still, Mikoto's brought him around, told him everything, as though we all don't fucking remember what he was, and what he nearly forced Mikoto to do to Mai last time he was involved with any of us HiME. I hate the idea that he might be able to help us - and I can't frankly see how he can - he's just one man who can't seem to even fund or motivate himself enough to finish art school. First District's funding and compensation, blood money, did not cover his expenses and he's spent the past ten years working odd jobs while trying to fuel a healthy addiction to cigarettes and alcohol._

_Damn him for making me want a cigarette even more than usual. It's such a stressful time, and I'm chewing on straws, trying to keep myself from starting up again. I just can't deal with the stress of fighting, of having to constantly worry about what stupid thing Nao's going to do now or what's going to happen to Jun if Shizuru and I get killed._

_Now Mai's not even here to be a fall back in case that reality comes to pass. _

_I cannot deal with this, the constant worry and nail biting. It's really not what I'm used to, and I'm no good at it._

_Shit. I'm late for my meeting and I've no excuses. My secretary has been buzzing the intercom for ten minutes now, telling me to hurry it up and prepare myself for this latest design conference. Perhaps they'll let me keep my job, as they know that the sudden disappearance of such a close friend will take its toll on a woman._

_Figures those bastards will use my sex against me, most likely as an excuse to get rid of me once and for all. _

_I suppose that I should have seen it coming. At least I still have Shizuru; she can be my voice of reason in these dark times._

_I hope we find Mai soon, we all need her far more than we know._

* * *

_Three Hours Later._

School had let out an hour ago, and Fujino Shizuru was glad to finally see another day with these children come to an end. There wasn't anything in particular that was _wrong_ with them, but she was finding it harder and harder for her to concentrate on the lessons she was supposed to be teaching when her mind was so clearly elsewhere. These were vital years to children, the principal had pointed out to her when she'd mentioned that things had not been going so well at home, and that if she couldn't perform to the standards that the school wanted than she should take some time off and collect herself.

Shizuru was no quitter; she would not allow some tension with Yuuki Nao, an insect hardly worth her time, to mess up her teaching. But now, with Tokiha – _Tate_ – Mai missing, everything was quickly changing from bad to worse. Shizuru closed her eyes and began the slow routine that she'd formed over the years of collecting her things and making sure that the children had done a good job cleaning up the classroom. This was no private school, and there was little budget to fund extra work for the already overworked janitorial staff. She threw a few stray papers into the recycle bin and closed the door behind her, keeping her movements as normal as she could. Normalcy was the way that she coped with these things, holding on to that sense of what was 'normal' until things finally escalated to the point when she could not even think of denying the apparent problems.

That was usually when she snapped.

She tensed, her hand still clenched around the door handle. Someone was here, a presence that she had not felt in ages; it was a presence that she did not want to feel ever again. She closed her eyes and exhaled as though tired, reaching into her purse and fumbling for her keys.

Oh yes, Shizuru was nothing if not a play actor. Her fingers closed around the wooden handle of the traditional tantou that her father had given her upon her high school graduation. It was a short blade, only about five inches - her father had had it made for her when she'd confessed to him her plans to be moving into a city and living in a less prosperous neighborhood after she left the Fuuka dorms. He'd watched her with sad eyes when she'd opened the gift, and then he'd made sure that she knew how to use it.

She pulled the knife out of her purse, its blade open to the air, and turned to face the intruder. "It is very like you to skulk in the shadows, Mr. Kanzaki."

Her eyes widened in horror as he stepped into the dwindling light streaming in long beams through the wide windows of the hallway. "What's happened to you?" She asked, her voice betraying the question in her mind. Inwardly, she cursed, for in admitting her surprise, she'd lost the upper hand in the argument.

Kanzaki looked horrible, as though he had not slept in weeks. There were large dark circles under his eyes and his breathing was coming in ragged breaths. It was his eyes, however, that warned of something far more sinister. They were black, like pools of obsidian – Shizuru tightened her grip on the tantou in her hand. She was in no mood to deal with the entity that had sent her to senselessly slaughter hundreds of people. She didn't know an escape, however; so she had to find a way to talk her out of this situation – for she would not summon her element in a place such as this. He now had her backed up against the wall - _quite literally_, she amended, as her back bumped up against the door that she'd closed only a moment before - with no where to run.

"Nothing that you wouldn't know about, Fujino." Kanzaki Reito said in a voice that sounded almost dead. She frowned and spread her legs, bending her knees and allowing her weight to shift ever so slightly forward - giving her a slight advantage over his taller build and greater weight, should they come to blows. "I merely am a pawn of the greater carnival now."

"The carnival ended fifteen years ago," Shizuru shot back. They all knew what Himeno had explained to both Midori and Natsuki, and the constant threat of what might happen if they got it wrong, but to suggest that the Carnival had never really ended to begin with, that was almost as an insane a notion as saying that Mai had merely taken a trip to the grocery story and simply had gotten lost on her way home. No, the truth was far more sinister, and Shizuru was not comfortable simply sitting by while events boiled to a head. "There is no way that it could still be continuing; you of all people should know that, Kanzaki. The evil which sleeps within you knows no bounds, and yet only at its defeat were you able to regain control of your body and the carnival was finally allowed to end."

He gave her a sad look, and Shizuru almost allowed herself to relax - but the manic feeling of panic settled in around her once more, the same feeling that had plagued her during the original carnival. She could not shake the feeling that she was being watched then, and that same feeling of constant dread for the future was slowly filtering back into her consciousness. Shizuru grit her teeth, telling herself that there was no reason to rise to the fallen entity's bait. She knew that the evil was still within her former classmate - one would have to be a foolish to think that a timeless entity would simply vanish into nothingness after being defeated once.

They would never have had to go through that ordeal fifteen years ago, had that been the case.

She leveled the tantou at Kanzaki's throat, her voice quiet and calm, deathly calm. "To what do I owe the pleasure of a conversation with the Obsidian Lord, then, Mr. Kanzaki?" Her muscles tensed, for he would strike soon.

He reached out, as if to brush the knife away from his neck, but seemed to change his mind half-way through the gesture. He stepped forward, pressing one hand against the wall and leaning in as though they were high school lovers engaged in a secret tryst in the shadows, away from their classmates. The knife rested against his jugular, and Shizuru could not help but think that it would be so easy to just kill the man where she stood - she knew that Natsuki would forgive her, in the end, Natsuki always did.

"That's right, isn't it, Fujino? All that matters if your precious summer princess," Kanzaki's voice was cold. His eyes were black, almost eternal, as she stared hard into them. She would not rise to him, for he had not been the one to send her over the edge then, and she would be damned once again if she would let someone as insignificant as Kanzaki Reito draw her once more into the peaceful chaos of madness. "Too bad she's so worried about Mai-HiME and how to hold her family together until this passes to realize just how close to the edge you really are."

"You know nothing," Shizuru said as evenly as she could. She knew that she could not summon her element, not here in the school. There were something, she'd sworn, that she would never attempt again. "This is not your battle any more, Obsidian Lord."

"No, this is a perversion of my battle," His hands were around her neck now, and she knew that he was still trying to entice her into drawing out her element, for he was not squeezing yet. When he started, she might have to take steps to stop him from killing her, but until that point, the red naginata would stay away. She would not allow herself to succumb to simply allowing violence to take her character over - for that was exactly what he - it - wanted. "This is a battle created by a dark pervasion of a little girl's heart, a little girl still waiting for her prince to come and rescue her."

Shizuru flinched at the weight of the words, for it was a two part jab at her integrity and the seeming 'unnaturalness' of her love for Natsuki. Midori had told them soon after the carnival had ended that their love for each other was actually written about in the legends - a pair of destined souls that traveled along with the spirits of the HiME. She'd thought it laughable at the time, for who would believe in such a thing as fate and soul mates so soon after the senseless slaughter of hundreds of innocents?

The Obsidian Lord, in his twisted way, was trying to show her something. As the body of Kanzaki Reito vanished into the growing twilight, Shizuru found herself wondering just what exactly he could have meant by that. She hastened on her way, a white knuckled grip on the blade in her hand never loosening until she was aboard the five-thirty train heading home.

Only then, when she was as far away from the Obsidian Lord as she could presently arrange, could she finally allow herself to let go of the knife.

"Interesting," She muttered to herself. She placed the polished wooden sheath back onto the tantou's blade and tucked it back safely into her purse, "he wants nothing to do with this, which means that this is a problem of our own creation."

She'd have to think on that for a while.

* * *

Nao was waiting for Natsuki when the exhausted woman finally emerged from the front entrance of the building at half-seven that night. Natsuki caught sight of the red head and nearly turned back around and headed back into the building when she saw the red-head, for no matter what she looked at it, there was very little that could be done for Nao's rather urgent case of general stupidity.

"What do you want?" Natsuki demanded as Nao fell into step beside her. They looked like two American power-executives, their suit-jackets blowing in the chilly November air and their long, loose pants flapping around their legs. Natsuki could not shake the feeling that there was something wrong with this general picture - for she always felt overdressed in her work clothes. She'd prefer jeans to these linen pants that did nothing against the wind any day, but she never complained. They were simply actors, most of the time - they had no cause to change the way they acted unless the need arose. Natsuki guessed that Nao would start to wear skirts within the next week or so - just to show off her legs at a time when no one else was doing that.

"Can't I walk with you?" Nao asked. "We do work in the same building, after all."

"I'd rather not, if it's all the same to you, Nao," Natsuki said gruffly. She did not want to have conversations with Nao about much of anything these days - and where she'd once welcomed the red-head's company, she was finding herself wanting to spend more and more time with Shizuru and Jun. Confirming, perhaps only for herself, that she loved Shizuru more than anyone else in the world.

Nao gave a 'have it your way' sort of shrug and continued, "I just got off the phone with Inspector Suzuki; he seems optimistic about some CCTV footage that they managed to dig up from that conbini across the street from Mai's restaurant." She paused, staring up into the sky with a strange expression that Natsuki could not place on her face, as if she wasn't quite sure what she was thinking of, per say. Natsuki frowned, staring at Nao - she hated when she could not read the younger girl - as it was always a sure-fire sign that she was up to something that could not be explained in any way that Natsuki could be considered satisfactory. She was, after all, a schemer at her absolute worst. "Where do you think Mai is?" Nao asked.

Natsuki, honestly, had not given it much thought - for all her thoughts had been focused on how they were going to get Mai back before Mikoto starved to death or the enemy decided, once again, that it needed to attack. Mai was a well of power that the rest of them did not possess in their current state, they desperately needed her to help them maintain their shaky control over the precarious situation they were in now.

After Mai vanished, the attacks had teetered out to only a few over the past week - all weak orphans that Natsuki or Nao could take down by themselves, if they worked at it. Natsuki thought the timing was a little too convenient for it to not be purposeful, and she wondered if things were finally starting to move. After all, they'd been fighting the grunt soldiers with only one fleeting glimpse of their enemy that could hardly count as a glimpse, as it was only a voice that they'd heard, and not a real person.

"I think that she knows exactly what she'd doing, where ever she is, Nao," Natsuki admitted at length. She was lying and she was pretty sure that Nao knew it as well. Nao was always good at detecting lies. "I just hope she's safe."

Nao's words of assent were silent, but Natsuki heard them anyway - she supposed that she had been waiting for them. She and Nao were usually on the same page about these things.

"I think that Kanzaki might have the right idea about how we should go about looking for Mai," Nao commented as they started down the stairs towards the subway station.

Natsuki looked at Nao sharply, "Don't trust that person, Nao. He's evil, far more evil than you know."

"What do you mean?" Nao asked.

"Kanzaki Reito is one of the few people in this world that I truly think that we have cause to fear." Natsuki said, sliding her card through the turnstile and walking through, not looking back at Nao. "I do not trust him, and you should not either. You know what sleeps within him."

"Kagutsuchi defeated that," Nao protested. "We were all there, we saw what Mai did."

"Or did he? The carnival would never have happened in the first place, Nao, of such a being as the Obsidian Lord could be killed."


	23. Chapter 23

**Passages, Chapter Twenty Three  
**

_Author's note - I went back and edited through some of the older chapters, making sure that I did not have any glaring mistakes in my story - like continuity mistakes or some other unforgivable blunder. I found a few, and if you catch any, please let me know._

_Also: I was astounded by the number of hits on this most recent chapter of _Passages_, nearly 400 in the week that I've had it up! That's more than the previous two chapters combined! A good 250 of them came in the first day that the story was up. For all that, however, I got three reviews. _

_I am not above begging for them, I just find that people who ask for them are in very poor taste and I never review when they ask; but this story is sort of like my baby and I find the lack of response to be rather troubling. This story grows and changes based on your input, dear reader, and I respect your opinion above all else. As the story begins to rise to it's climax, I need your help more than ever. _

_So review, point out the problems and plot holes, ask questions, make me look at things from different perspectives. I need that more than anything else when I write. I need your help to make this story great.  
_

* * *

_Day eight and Mai is still missing. I've been trying to figure out what I would have answered Nao, had I actually put the time into answering her yesterday. I honestly have no idea where the blasted woman could have gotten to, this simply isn't like her. It's so strange for Mai to not be here, and I find myself missing her greatly. I hate the feeling of powerlessness this whole situation is forcing upon me. I feel as though I'm sixteen again and facing my death with no idea what's going to happen to me. _

_I'm scared for Jun, for this enemy knows us so much better than I would like it to know. It is a creature takes the evil within us and uses against us. I hate it. I hate this whole thing._

_I hate the feeling of being so powerless to stop what's happening to me. I'm not _powerless_, I'm just one person. I cannot be a one-woman army. This fucking sucks._

_I really wish that I could _talk_ to someone. Shizuru's out of the question and where I would usually go to Nao, I now have to tread carefully to make sure to not ruffle Shizuru's feathers to the point of mass-murder._

_I don't want anything to happen to Nao._

_She and I have grown… close in the past few years. _

_I want to make her happy, but I am not the one that is most important to her in the world. She cannot love me, for my heart already belongs to another._

* * *

Three Hours Later.

Kuga Natsuki yawned tiredly and flopped down on the kitchen table, resting her head on her crossed arms. The bright lights of the kitchen had all been turned off, and only the dim glow of the low-wattage light above the stove did little to provide the room with adequate enough illumination for her to truly scrutinize the face of the woman sitting primly across the table. She scowled, peering through the darkness at her lover, trying to make sense of her without actually coming out and saying anything.

This was so typical of their interactions that Natsuki barely found it within herself to treat the situation with contempt. They were so broken that they constantly found themselves at impasses like this one- where they could not actually share information with each other for fear of ruining the image of a perfect life that they'd striven so hard to create. Natsuki sighed, for she knew that she was simply lying to herself when she said that they were perfect. They were far from it.

Jun was one of the few things that managed to hold them together. Shizuru was always too distant for Natsuki's taste, too flaky and too insincere in her words at times. Words held great power with Natsuki, for they had once been the currency with which Shizuru had bought her love. Now there were precious few that passed between them with any _true_ meaning, and Natsuki hated that feeling. She loved Shizuru with all her heart, but she knew, perhaps better than anyone else, what a pain Shizuru could be to live with.

Natsuki frowned and flicked a forgotten rice husk from dinner across the table towards Shizuru. It landed on her shoulder and bounced off into the crumpled napkin that lay there - discarded after Natsuki had sneezed a few moments before. "What's eating you?" she asked. Natsuki knew that something was bothering Shizuru, for she was being far too quiet for thoughts not to be racing through that carefully neutral face. In the light, earlier, Natsuki had seen marks on her neck and had nearly broken her chopsticks in her anger at Shizuru's simple dismissal of them as just incidental injuries from a rambunctious and slightly homesick student at work. How she suggest that such an obvious injury was 'nothing'? It wasn't nothing, because she was hurt, and just seeing her like that made Natsuki's blood boil.

Still, Shizuru had talked her down, using kind words and the little word games that always drove Natsuki to distraction. Natsuki had felt the anger leave her and had fallen into a sullen silence, annoyed that her lover would dismiss something so clearly important and painful as just another day with the second graders.

If that was true, Natsuki was a monkey's uncle.

Shizuru looked honestly pensive for a minute, and Natsuki's eyes narrowed. _About time she started letting her face show what's going on inside there_, Natsuki thought bitterly, intently gazing at the woman across the table. "I believe that we may have a much bigger problem than Tate Yuuichi's missing wife," she stated. Her tone suggested that she didn't really want to talk about just how she knew this - but that she was willing to entertain Natsuki's ideas about what was bothering her. Natsuki hated the inequality in these exchanges, but she had learned over the years that it was not in her power to change Shizuru into something other than the equal combination of infuriating and endearing that Natsuki had fallen in love with in the first place.

"Oh?" Natsuki kept her face even as she questioned Shizuru's statement, she could play this game better than anyone she knew; that was the advantage of living with Fujino Shizuru for as long as Natsuki had. She'd been playing it for years now, slowly accepting the fact that she meant the world to Shizuru, but that the older woman had been brought up in such a way that actual casual interaction was hardly even allowed. She had to keep her features schooled, and her emotions private, even when Natsuki was begging her lover to, just once, show some genuine feelings.

Natsuki knew the reason why Shizuru was like this; it came from a complicated family history and a long-standing hatred of the most unfortunate moment in her maternal side of the family's history. Her grandmother on her mother's side had been an unfortunate gift from an American soldier during the war; and Shizuru had inherited his looks - making her the sandy-haired black sheep of the family. Natsuki remembered the few occasions that she had actually met Shizuru's family, country-bumpkins, the lot of them; but so cruel in their assumptions. Shizuru was like that man who'd deflowered their family, and therefore she could not be trusted. Natsuki had never met such cruel people before, and Shizuru's mother's constant apologies for her daughter's appearance had started to grate on Natsuki's nerves before they had even been there an hour.

Shizuru had just developed all of the little ticks that drove Natsuki up the wall to survive in a world where her family wasn't exactly thrilled about her existence. She was just a reminder of a different time, when things were not nearly as good for her family as they were now; Natsuki wished that she could have been there for Shizuru during those formative years when she'd first started to lose herself in the 'perfect-daughter' image that she was always forced to put above her own personality and wishes. Natsuki could have saved her from all that, treated her with the kindness that the sandy-haired girl had needed to truly become her own person - and not some twisted hybrid of East and West that would never truly fit in anywhere.

"I had a conversation with Kanzaki earlier," Shizuru tapped her chin.

Natsuki leaned forward, intrigued beyond her annoyance with the fact that Shizuru had not divulged this fact as soon as she'd gotten home. They were supposed to be in love, the shining example of the couple that could never die - for they were blessed with the sort of love that fairy tales were written out of. Natsuki scowled at the thought - for theirs was no different from any other relationship that Natsuki had witnessed. They were miserable and on each other's nerves most of the time, and then they had sex and everything got better for a little while. It was a twisted cycle that they'd willingly trapped themselves in: this domesticity. "What does he want now?"

Shizuru leaned back in her chair, bridging her fingers on the table in front of her. "It wasn't what Kanzaki said, that was the interesting thing; it was something that that being implied."

They both shared the opinion that Kanzaki Reito was a being working with the HiME purely for his own reasons. He had no reason or justification to want to help them as Kanzaki Reito, but the Obsidian Lord that slept within him had become more and more vocal in recent years, occasional surfacing and startling Mai or Mikoto with his poisonous tones and barely veiled threats. While the HiME could still materialize their elements, their main weapon - the Child - had been directly tied into the Obsidian Lord's battle, and it was not likely, Midori thought, that they would be able to ever summon those creatures ever again.

Natsuki still believed that she would see Duran once more. He'd gotten so big when she'd finally admitted to the world just how much she'd loved Shizuru, and she longed to once more fight beside him. The fear, growing inside her since Nao's moment of weakness, was that if they were ever able to summon the creatures to aid them in the fight again, that Duran would not come. Natsuki did not really know who was the most important person to her in the world - and she had to know in order to win this battle.

"What did that being imply?" Natsuki questioned. They were both being purposefully vague to avoid having to mention the dreaded name. It was like You-Know-Who, in those English novels that Shizuru had read to Jun two years before; there was great power in a name. Naming the Obsidian Lord was like assigning power to him, of which he currently had none. Natsuki wanted to keep it that way, if it could be arranged.

Shizuru sighed and stood up, stretching her arms up over her head, allowing her shirt to rise up to expose skin that Natsuki realized she had not touched in over two weeks. They'd been so busy, so distant - they'd been trying to protect themselves from the terrifying notion that they could die in these fights; and that the glaring void in their lives due to Mai's unexplainable absence was driving a wedge into places when Natsuki had been sure the redhead had no influence. Shizuru sighed and picked up the tea things from her side of the table and carried them over to the sink. "He said that this whole farce of a battle and a carnival was the creation of one person's mind, I do not know of a HiME with the power to manipulate the darkness within ourselves to her own ends - so it must be an outside force."

Natsuki's eyes widened. She knew of one - the one that had sworn that she wanted nothing to do with this whole charade. If he was suggesting that she'd somehow come into that much power, they were in a very tight spot indeed. Mai had been the one to deal with that dark child, and now Mai was gone. They could not ask her for help. "There is one," she muttered, standing as well. She crossed the kitchen, her feet padding on the floor, the only sound in the room other than the steady breathing of their two bodies. "I did not have any dealings with it, personally - it was Mai's battle."

Shizuru's eyes narrowed and in the half light, she looked positively evil. Natsuki swallowed and tried to not think about what she was witnessing in her lover. "It would be just our luck, then, that Mai has taken something of a short break."

Natsuki was astounded that Shizuru would have the gall to actually put those thoughts into words. "She's gone for a reason, most likely because the person who that child belongs to was in love with her husband for her entire childhood."

Shizuru sighed, and turned away from Natsuki. "I suspected as much," she said quietly. Natsuki raised a hand to touch her shoulder, with the hopes of comforting her when it was so clear than Shizuru needed some form of reassurance. "This changes things, Natsuki, because that person is now our greatest threat. He's manipulating this, somehow. He always good at that while we were still at school."

Natsuki agreed with her, and placed her hand comfortingly on Shizuru's shoulder. It was oddly fitting, really, that they were standing in the darkness together - for they were completely ignorant of how their live would change in the next minute, the next day, and the next month. Natsuki hated being in the dark, for she'd been kept there for most of her childhood and she'd hated it then. She was old enough, finally, to know what was fully going on around her and she was suddenly filled the feeling of dread that she had not felt for nearly fifteen years.

They could die.

Once again they were mortal.

Shizuru turned and opened her arms to Natsuki, drawing the shorter (much to her continued annoyance) woman into a tight embrace. "We will beat this thing," she said. Her voice was filled with the determination and resoluteness that she'd used _that_ night as well. Only this time, Shizuru was not promising to murder hundreds of people in her name, her words were a simple promise that they would finally get to the bottom of what was forcing all this heartbreak upon them. "I promise you, Natsuki, we will beat this thing and no one will die." She was lying, and Natsuki knew it, but she took comfort in the words anyway.

Natsuki tilted her head upwards and caught Shizuru's cheek against her lips, kissing her there to thank her for being such a kindly and constant presence in her life. They had gone through so much together, and while Natsuki was still terrified that they were somehow doing something wrong – for there was nothing that felt more _right_ than this moment.

Shizuru smiled, her eyes flashing dangerously as the light from the hallway caught them. She took Natsuki's chin in her hands and kissed her nose, and then her mouth. It was not a sensual, chaste kiss. Natsuki was used to this by now, the searing contact of lips upon lips, the battle for dominance of their tongues as they tried to express their love for each other in ways that words could not really describe. She let Shizuru do it tonight, let her lead even though Natsuki usually preferred to, and surrendered to the sensation.

She needed the break.

Shizuru's hands danced around the hem of Natsuki's nice linen work shirt, occasionally brushing up against skin in such a way that caused Natsuki to gasp into Shizuru's mouth. This was too much, they'd been denying this for far too long. Circumstances always had a way of sneaking up on them and making their coming together less and less frequent as the years went by.

And yet, Natsuki was always left wondering why they didn't do this _more_. It would not complicate things in the least and she was sure that both Shizuru and herself would benefit from the release.

She pulled back, her breath coming in short gasps as she wondered, yet again, how exactly it was that Shizuru managed to ensnare her so completely in just a simple kiss. "We should not do this here." The rest of the sentence, the fear that Jun could witness something that he should not have to see. They were a family, and he was no fool – he knew that they loved each other; but he did not need to see the desperation behind their love – the barely concealed want that came to the surface only when Shizuru or Natsuki was so desperate that they could not stand it any more.

Shizuru nodded and took Natsuki's hand into her own, leading her down the hallway and into their bedroom, closing and locking the door behind her.

Natsuki had her pressed up against the door with her arms around her neck before the lock had clicked into place. She kissed everywhere that she could see, desperately searching for whatever it was that they seemed to be losing with every passing year. They lied to each other and did things that hurt each other as though they were nothing, and they always forgave each other for past faults - Natsuki was positive that they were both sitting on rather large secrets that could never truly be forgiven, should they be discovered.

This was how she forgot about those problems.

"I love you," she whispered into the crook Shizuru's neck. She kissed her lover on her pulse point, sucking and biting has gently as she could. Shizuru still had to work in the morning, and it would be bad if she had marks on her neck that could not be hidden except for a rather liberal application of make-up. They'd had the problem in the past, and Shizuru's superiors at that school had not taken too well to the amount of make up she'd put on that day. "I love you. I love you. I love you." Over and over again, like a mantra, she said the words as she kissed Shizuru.

Nao was making her panic, saying those foolish things that implied so much and yet so little room for debate. Nao _must_ love someone, but Natsuki doubted that it was her, and that Nao was just thinking about the only person who'd actually bothered much with her over the past few years. Natsuki knew that she loved Shizuru above all others, and that it was the sandy-haired woman that would draw her in, again and again and again.

Shizuru kissed her tenderly, her fingers dancing over the buttons on Natsuki's shirt. "I will love you forever, _Na-tsu-ki."_

Natsuki closed her eyes, forcing down the panic that always rose up when Shizuru said her name _like that_. This was not the time for fears, for they'd done this many, many times before.


	24. Chapter 24

**Passages, Chapter Twenty Four**

_Author's note - Have you ever thought about the genders of the HiME's children? Like how it's really obvious that Kagutsuchi's a guy and that Diana and Julia are girls? We know that there's a process that the HiME go through in order to first summon their children, it's almost a binding ceremony. We saw Mai's in the anime, and it was quite a powerful moment. I'm trying to work the summoning of a HiME's child back into the story, but with all the drama and confusion I've created, it's not likely that you'll see Duran any time soon. Such a shame, really, I rather liked him._

_Also, y yes, i do leik mudkipz. Thanks so much for the reviews, they were lovely.  
_

* * *

_I woke up this morning alone. It was a strange sensation, and one that I have not had the displeasure of experiencing in a very long time. The bed was cold and Shizuru had not thought to pull up her half of the blankets so what little warmth remained after her departure could keep the rest of the bed warm. I hate being cold. _

_ Shizuru left a note on the bedside table saying that she was going out for a walk to 'think' - which is code for her need to smash things and generally feel angry for a while before being able to put on her mask of steely coolness once more. She's probably going through the neighbor's recycling and throwing the beer bottles against the wall and making frustrated noises. I've seen her do this several times throughout the course of our relationship, but this is the first time that I think she actually needs the catharsis. I wish that she would talk to be, but the desperation of our love-making last night was enough to tell me that I need to get my act together or risk losing her for good. _

_Even as I told her I loved her, bringing her to the edge of that blissful oblivion of ecstasy, I felt as though I was lying. I do love her, more than anything, but at the same time, I feel as though I'm starting to not. _

_Perhaps I'm just afraid of what might happen if I tell her that I've had enough. I've seen her go over the edge, and with her already teetering so close to the abyss, I don't want to risk it. _

_I don't want to let her know how much seeing her hurting rips apart my own heart. _

_Why do I do this to myself? I have a happy existence, and while Shizuru is not the easiest person to live with, I know that I'm little better. _

_We're both so stubborn that nothing ever gets done. Our lives are filled with secrets, hidden glances, and gentle touches in the darkness. I want to love her fully, to tell her I love her in public, but in order to do that, I would have to be a boy. _

_Our lives are beautiful, but we are not. We're just broken people who are too bound to the past to live for the present. We're so scared to breaking this precious peace that we've found that we're going backwards in our relationship. I wonder if that's what Nao sensed to cause her to make her move. _

_Kissing her was... different. _

_I like Shizuru better. I can read her emotions from her kisses, where Nao is as closed off as ever. _

_How do I cope with this? _

_Jun's waking up; I've got to get him ready for school. Shizuru's left lunch for us on the counter, carefully packed into three beautiful boxes. Perhaps I'll take her's today, just to see what happens. Maybe it will be an excuse to take off at lunch and come and see her, I am not likely to see her before she leaves for work today, and there were so many things that I left unsaid that I feel as though I should at least make sure that she's not going to murder the children. _

_It will be good to see her on neutral ground, anyway._

* * *

_Outside time, but approximately five hours earlier. _

The world was dark, the oppressive, suffocating sort of darkness that trapped even those whose inner light shone brighter than most. It clung to every available nook and cranny, shoving itself into every orifice and clogging all the senses. This was the darkness of a blackened and poisoned heart, the sort of heart that was capable of destroying hundreds of lives just for the one goal that it strove for. The darkened plane had trapped the final, the dark and hidden child, Yatagarasu. This was the creature that preyed on the darkness that lived within all humans, taking her powers from the seeds of madness and evil that grew within the scorned and rejected of society.

It was no mistake that she had chosen Munakata Shiho to be her avatar on earth during the Obsidian Lord's carnival. The little girl who'd been rejected by the man she'd loved had grown up to be a woman scorned. It was a petty reason to draw the fighting out, but the battle had to continue. There was just too much that was left unresolved since the last carnival - and too many of the HiME were growing complacent in their idle years. They had to be ready, things would start changing soon.

Yatagarasu trapped the fiery Kagutsuchi user within the blackness of her own avatar's heart. She was sure that the girl would break out on her own and finally gain the insight that the HiME needed to defeat the growing storm. The Obsidian Lord would not stay quiet, but even he didn't know exactly what was taking place - spending his existence tied to human souls meant that he missed much of what was going on around him.

It was only a matter of time now.

Mai opened her eyes to blackness so thick that she was positive that if she'd had a knife on her, she'd have some trouble cutting through it. She closed her eyes and concentrated, listening as hard as she could, desperately searching for something, anything, which could tie her down to this plane of reality. She shouted, and her words fell flat. There was no echo. She was looking for an anchor in this darkness, but even as she pictured her elements around her wrists and ankles, she knew that she was trapped here. The flames of her elements did nothing to illuminate this place, their light barely reaching Mai's eyes through the hazy darkness.

She opened her mouth, screaming for someone, anyone, to hear her. She was trapped, and powerless.

"Kagutsuchi!" she cried. She wanted the large creature's comfort now more than ever. Where she'd once been slightly afraid of the awesome power that the creature left at her disposal - now all she wanted was to hear the comfort of the strange cooing noises that the creature made. She loved her child on so many levels, for it was as though Kagutsuchi was a part of her in a way that Yuuichi could never be. He was the fire within her, the light in her heart that could never be extinguished. He was the power behind her every action, the best representation of her person.

Mai wanted to see him so badly.

The darkness pressed in around her and Mai struggled to remember what it felt like to feel the sun on her face. She recalled the heat of Kagutsuchi's fires as he fought along side her as nothing more than a dull memory. She was very quickly losing all sense of reality in this place.

Mai closed her eyes and focused her thoughts inward - trying to solve the problem of their current situation though unraveling her own. This really wasn't her field, for even during the Carnival, Mai had mostly just followed Natsuki's lead. Natsuki had actually known what was going on to some extent and had been able to lead them through the twisted thorns of Searrs' occupation of the school with little problems. It was only when Natsuki's own problems caught up to her that she fell apart. Mai was so proud of her for understanding that Kanzaki Reito - the Obsidian Lord - had picked her to be the victor even before the battle had begun. The game had been stacked then.

Just like it was stacked now. Mai had no idea how to escape from a place like this, and she couldn't think of a reason why she'd want to. Here was safe, the blackness was warm and comforting; she could stay here forever and never have to again think about the problems of her life. It would make life so much easier, she knew.

She was so scared. The darkness was a wonderful oblivion to fall into and escape the paralyzing fear for her family and friends. There were going to be deaths before this was all over, and there was no longer a kind and benevolent force to rescue them from the brink of oblivion. Death was real this time around.

Mai squeezed her eyes shut, even though it did nothing - trying to shut out the fear. She was powerless here, powerless to do anything. Fate would run its course without her and she had no power to stop it. The only hope she had was escape.

She took one step forward, and then another, allowing the fire within her to guide her path even though she could not see it. She was sure in her step, positive that Kagutsuchi would rescue her should she start to run afoul within this flat plane of darkness.

It pressed into her, pushing the air out of her lungs and forcing her to pause between her steps. Every movement was growing to be a struggle, but Mai ground her teeth together and continued. She had to get out; there was no way around it. She was the one who was responsible for Arisa, for Yuuichi; for them all. Natsuki had never been one to take on a responsibility like that - she wouldn't know how to be there for the others. Mai had been doing this for so long that it was almost second nature for her to seek to be the mother-hen of their little group. All of them were afraid, some more so than others. Mai felt her lips turn upwards into a manic smile as she realized that she was falling once again. The effort to move forward had finally knocked the wind out of her, and even breathing in short gasps did little to fill her lungs with air once again.

"Ka..." she gasped. She knew that this, more than ever, was when she needed to be rescued. She had no idea where she was, or how she had gotten there. She merely wanted to get away once more. She was powerless here, and it was the power of being a HiME that Mai had yet to fully embrace. She did not like the fact that she was as powerful as she was, because she had no real interest in power, the way that Natsuki or maybe even Mikoto had. She had to escape, just to prove them all wrong. "Kagu-" she faltered once more. Even speaking was difficult now; she could not get enough air into her lungs. Mai longed for the gentle oblivion of unconsciousness, because, at least then, she'd be able to see light once more. Mai grit her teeth and finally managed to utter the child's full name. She hoped that she'd traveled far enough through the darkness for him to hear her and come to rescue her, but she could never be sure. _"Kagutsuchi!" _she shouted. Her voice sounded feeble in the pressing darkness and Mai sighed and tried to move forward.

A light was growing ahead of her, slowly cutting though the inky blackness and blinding Mai as it grew in intensity. She heard the soft cooing of her child as she fainted.

She did not know how much time had passed as she lay unconscious, And it was just as well, really, for she would not have wanted to be awake from the painful process that her child was dragging her through, slowly removing her from the black prison, a place to put people to forget about them, into the light once more. Mai slept fitfully, her dreams filled with visions of far off battles and a distant foe that had only just started to fulfill its promise to kill them all.

_What is it doing?_ Mai wondered as she felt the pull of wakefulness once more.

Mai groggily opened her eyes, hissing in pain as the near-blinding light of the sun filtered through the tiny slits that she'd allowed herself. It hurt so much, but soon the world swam into focus once more.

She was in a place that she thought she would never see again. She'd put the school out of her mind for so long that she'd completely forgotten what it felt like to have the eyes of so many young people, still children really, staring at her as she slowly glanced around.

She was lying in the middle of a flower bed, carefully tended and cut back for the winter, a few small, evergreen shrubs still supporting greenery as everything else had long since lost it's color. In front of her rose the glassed-in pavilion of the school that she'd attended as a much younger person. She frowned, and glanced around to see many orange and grey clad students, clearly on their way to class, staring at her with the intense looks that Mai had received upon her arrival to Fuuka almost sixteen years before. She'd been late then too.

There was something uncomfortable pressing into her back and Mai squirmed to get away from it. She was acutely filled with a sense of what the Europeans called deja-vu' - for she was certain that she'd been here, in this exact position before. She rolled over and realized that a large, severed root had been the cause of her discomfort and she bit back the urge to laugh. She'd ruined the famous flowerbed of Fuuka Academy again.

"Miss Tokiha," came a light, slightly amused voice from her direct left. Mai turned her head and blinked as the smiling face of Himeno Fumi came sharply into focus. "I believe that the previous head of the school had a very similar sentiment to mine about you destroying the flower beds."

* * *

Tokiha Takumi frowned as he contemplated the clock - it was growing later and later and he still had not heard from Inspector Suzuki in over two days with news of his sister. He was getting worried that somehow their investigation had gotten shunted aside for something more pressing. He could tell that the inspector thought that Mai was just another 'runaway wife' who would come home when she was ready to face the pressures of her home life once again.

Takumi knew that Mai would never just run away from her life, for he was one of the few who knew just how much she reveled in the responsibility of it. She knew better than anyone the stresses of being in charge of so many people, and what he'd managed to get Akira to tell him seemed to suggest that the HiME were once again needed to battle against some evil force. That, honestly, worried him more than Mai's absence. Takumi remembered all too well what it was like to fade into darkness; and it was not an experience he wanted to repeat until he was old enough to have grandchildren. His heart had been repaired by a team of brilliant American surgeons and he'd had no real problems with it since the surgery. He wanted nothing more than to live his life out to the fullest extent he could and not be hindered by anything as troublesome as disappearing should Akira ever be defeated in battle.

He frowned and cracked his knuckles before making a bridge of them and resting his head against them. He needed something to do with his time while the restaurant was closed. Tate would not let him open the restaurant while Mai was missing, and Takumi wasn't really feeling that up to opening it as it was. He knew that Mai brought something special to the food she prepared, and he doubted that he could hold a candle to it.

His cell phone began to beep a shrill rendition of one of Akira's favorite songs - some American rap song that had somehow found its way onto Japanese airwaves. He picked it up and was greeted with the little envelope with wings that told him that he had e-mail waiting for him. He clicked through the menus and soon found himself eagerly reading an e-mail from Yuuki Nao.

_Talked to Suzuki, says that Mai's case is still a priority, but no leads. Kuga wants to meet and discuss options at soonest available time. Perhaps bowling? Tate needs to get out of that house. _

Takumi smiled and hit the reply button, knowing that Akira would be all for getting together and trying to make sense of why Mai vanished. The group had not gathered since then, mostly because Mikoto's older brother, Kanzaki, had started to hang around the school and Akira did not trust him any further than she could throw him. The man was bad news, and from what Mai had said about carnival after he'd ... died seemed to imply that Kanzaki Reito was behind most of the conflict.

_Tomorrow evening is free_, he typed, hitting his next button as he flipped through the kanji for the appropriate combination to convey his point. _ Should we arrive earlier or later than everyone else? _

Takumi knew that Yuuki Nao had her own problems to deal with, and that she might want a few minutes alone with Kuga before everyone else showed up. They were, after all, not nearly as important characters in this battle as some of the others were.

Takumi would not have been surprised if they'd simply forgotten he and Akira existed.

Perhaps it was better that way.


	25. Chapter 25

**Passages, Chapter Twenty Five**

_Author's note - This story is always so much fun to write, but I just finished watching Simoun. Great anime if you haven't seen it. Anyway, my mind is filled with silly stories of transgendered anime - lolol Floe becaome Floef. :D _

* * *

_I called Shizuru at work, something I shouldn't do on principle, as it's really considered quite rude when you think about it. One shouldn't call a teacher while she's teaching, my gut tells me. Habit and years of practice, however, have helped me to learn her schedule to the point that I know when she has off periods. Her students are off at lunch or in gym class, and she's sitting in the teacher's room grading papers – that's when I call her._

_I didn't know how to tell her that I just wanted to see her, so I made up some silly story about taking her lunch this morning - which I did - but it still sounded foolish when I said it. I asked her if she wanted to share lunch with me in the small park near the school where she taught. It was close enough that she could return if she was needed, but removed enough that it would not be blatantly obvious to the residents that everyone's favorite teacher was stepping out to have lunch with a dashing stranger._

_Actually, I don't think of myself as that dashing, but people seem to attach that label to me all the time, I can't think why._

_ The park is perfect for such lunchtime gatherings, however._

_I hate this - the carefully structured nature of our encounters as of late. We're both trying so hard to make sure that we don't piss each other off that it's starting to really hurt, just seeing her. _

_I love her so much; I don't want this to end because of my own stupidity. _

_This whole thing began of my own stupidity. I was so lost after the carnival, when everyone was dealing with their life-affirming fornication - Shizuru and I did none of that. There was never exactly sex, just the careful caress and gentle interaction of two souls that knew each other in such a way that no other entity could ever help to compete with. We just fell into each other's arms as though there was no other real option for us._

_I really should know better than to venture to my memories of that time, because they are a sea of studying and Shizuru, too many memories that I've kept closely guarded because I'm afraid of what might happen if I make a mistake and suddenly lose everything. _

_With Shizuru, everything hinges upon me, it's a feeling that I cannot grow used to, because I don't like taking responsibility for someone else's sanity. I sometimes feel as though I've got such a slim grip on my own that the added burden of having to make sure, constantly, that Shizuru is not about to go completely insane is just too much._

_I think that she needs to know about Nao. I've told her to some extent, but at the same time, I've kept the details from her. I think she knows because she's, well, Shizuru. Shizuru the incredibly and annoyingly perceptive; Shizuru the beautiful and deadly; Shizuru the woman I love. There is no middle ground with her, I'm either in or out, but Nao throws an intriguing wrench into the works that I am not fully prepared to deal with. _

_I do not love Nao. I never will. I care for her because she is almost like a sister to me. I've seen her at her lowest and her best, and yet I know that she's hurting far more than I am right now. _

_I should leave soon._

* * *

_Ten minutes later._

The phone rang once, and then again, a persistent beeping into the earpiece of Kuga Natsuki's late-model cell phone. She couldn't abide by the newer models with all their bulk and too many keys. Her old one still worked and functioned as she wanted it to and she saw no reason to move away from something that was already clearly working so well. She frowned, wondering why Shizuru was not picking up on the other end. She knew for a fact that it was lunch time and she had been granted a peaceful reprieve from the children she was supposed to be teaching for at least another hour. Many of the elementary school children still went home for lunch, which left Shizuru with time to grade papers and prepare lessons. Or go eat lunch with Natsuki, whatever the case may be. "Pick up the phone, idiot," she growled. Her secretary had been peeking in through the door every few minutes, trying to entice her to come and 'eat with the rest of the guys' - something that she had no interest in doing, whatsoever.

After the fifth ring, usually when the phone went to voicemail, Shizuru picked up. She sounded tired and harassed, but better than she had the night before. "Fujino."

"It's me," Natsuki said with a small sigh. She tipped her chair back, "I'm leaving now, so I'll be there in ten minutes. Can you meet me by the front gate?" She wasn't leaving just yet, but she didn't want to idle on her motorcycle outside of an elementary school. Somehow, she thought that that image would not go over well with the school officials who were bound to notice her. She wanted to give Shizuru ample time to get ready before she arrived.

"Natsuki, I'm not sure this is such a good idea," She sounded exhausted. Far more tired than Natsuki had heard her in years.

"It'll be fine, Shizuru," Natsuki laughed, pulling on her leather jacket. This was the second time in as many days that she'd driven her motorcycle to work. It was starting to become a habit, but the parking was expensive and the petrol even more. There was no way that their budget could continue to support her commute on any means other than public transportation. "When was the last time we actually lived?"

Shizuru was silent; Natsuki knew that she was contemplating this point. Natsuki knew it to be a good one, because they'd gotten so lost in the drama of their recent interactions that they'd forgotten the tenderness of a simple gesture. She intended to remind Shizuru of just how they were bonded together as best as she could - for it seemed that they were drifting apart in a most unpleasant way. Natsuki would not stand for that. "You have a point; I will be ready in ten minutes."

Natsuki closed her phone with a snap.

Natsuki brushed past her secretary with barely a look towards him. The man was used to it by now, and Natsuki had no intention of being friendly towards him just because he happened to work for her. Everyone in this company, it seemed, worked for her on some level, and she was frankly quite sick of it. She hated to be the one that everyone looked up to - for she had never been the natural leader during the carnival, just a lone wolf with her own agenda. It had suited her just fine then, and she intended to keep things that way.

She stalked past the rows of cubicles of the various engineers slaving away on their latest project. Several looked up and nodded respectfully to her. Natsuki returned the gesture without so much as a second thought. It was always good, after all, to be polite, even if she thought that these people were among the most trying of all the people in the entire world.

"Miss Kuga!" Someone called from down the hallway as Natsuki stabbed moodily at the downwards pointing arrow that would call the elevator up to the floor. She looked up to see one of the Chief Engineers trotting towards her. Natsuki sighed, she would have no choice but to talk to him, and frankly that was not on her agenda for the day. The elevator dinged and Natsuki stepped inside, sticking her hand out to keep the door open as the man finally caught up with her.

"Thanks," he said. He was slightly breathless from his rush to catch the elevator, but Natsuki found herself giving him the best smile she could muster without grimacing. She thought that she'd managed it alright, as he flashed her a broad smile in return. "Kuga, I have a question for you."

Natsuki crossed her arms, the leather of her jacket straining with the gesture, as the jacket was still fairly new. Natsuki had totaled her old jacket a few years ago on an icy road and this one had yet to reach the level of broken-in-ness that Natsuki preferred with her motorcycle gear. She nodded to the man, daring him to ask her something incredibly stupid. The engineers were all the same, really, because they never thought that highly of her, even if she was their boss.

"You drive a Ducati motorcycle, right?" He asked, rubbing his hand against the back of his neck nervously. Natsuki's eyes narrowed, she was in no mood for a lecture on the fact that she was not riding the product she helped to produce. She wanted, oh how she wanted, for the foolish salary man to make the mistake of criticizing her taste. The verbal tirade alone would be worth it. She nodded, urging him to go on. "The reason I ask is because a friend of mine is having some serious problems with his brakes and I was wondering if you knew a place where he could get it looked at. The market's not all that good for those models here, you know? And none of our guys have any idea how to handle the Ducati's ..." He trailed off, looking at Natsuki hopefully.

Natsuki shrugged, wishing that she could be of more help; she'd always done her own work on the bike, so she honestly could not help him. "I do my own work, so I don't know." She didn't add in the obligatory apology, as would have been polite in proper Japanese, but Natsuki was no about to say she was sorry for not being able to do anything. She could have given him Yamada's name, for he still did some side work on the few older Ducati models that still existed in the country.

The elevator dinged, indicating that they were on the ground level. Natsuki shrugged one last time at the man, biting her tongue and falling into the social constructs of the Japanese language. She couldn't help it, it had been ingrained into her since the day she was born and even though she wanted nothing to do with the insincere smiles and non-confrontational attitude of her coworkers, she had to follow the rules. "Sorry to not be of any help," she ground her teeth together as she said it. She had an image to maintain, and it was not one of friendliness or benevolence. She had trained all of her life to kill and fight, she couldn't help but feel out of place in the corporate world.

"Ah, is that so? Well, thank you anyway," the man bowed slightly. "Excuse me then."

Natsuki nodded and stepped off of the elevator, her hair billowing out behind her. The heaters just inside the glass-paneled doors at the base of the building blasted her with hot, dry heat that reminded Natsuki of the time that she'd had to take a trip to Egypt for the company. The heat was like the air there, and she sneezed, the dryness tickling her nose. Frowning and muttering about foolishness of blasting people with hot air when it wasn't even that cold out seemed to be just a waste of power and air, Natsuki stepped outside.

"Stupid," she muttered, cutting across the street and heading down into the underground parking garage where she'd paid close to the week's grocery budget to park her bike. Natsuki knew that she really couldn't ride the thing to work, and this wasn't like Fuuka, where there conveniently placed woods that made hiding such an expensive piece of machinery easy. She pocketed her parking ticket and gunned the engine into life.

The ride was a short one, even though the distance suggested that it would be long. No one was on the road at this time of day, for everyone who could afford a car in the current conditions was either at work or off doing something equally productive in their car. Natsuki made the trip in under the time that she'd allotted herself, and sat idling in front of the tan concrete wall around the school where Shizuru taught.

Natsuki closed her eyes and sat back, wondering what was keeping Shizuru - she could hear the shrieks and cries of happily playing children. She couldn't remember a time when her life had been that carefree, there was always the pressing weight of some responsibility upon her. Natsuki hated the fact that she was unable to feel the happiness that some children felt on a daily basis, it made her feel as though there were something wrong with her. She could not think of what that could mean for someone like herself. She was a well-rounded person; there were just times that Natsuki was positive that she was somehow doing something wrong.

Natsuki exhaled, her ears picking up on the quiet clock of heels on pavement. Shizuru was approaching, but Natsuki was very careful to give no sign that she'd noticed. HiME senses were different for everyone, and Natsuki was quite sure that Shizuru's powers came from her ability to detach herself from reality when the need arose. Those were their other powers, the ones that were kept private for they were almost too alien for even the other HiME to understand. The heightened senses came in handy most of the time, but Natsuki hated the fact that Shizuru could never get away with her sneak-attacks as she used to. It seemed that dying, along with all the other stuff that the carnival had put her though, had made it so that her senses were far above the normal human standard.

Shizuru's hand was on her shoulder, and her breath close to Natsuki's ear. "Guess who," she said, a smile in her voice.

Natsuki did her best to act surprised. "Shizuru!" She pulled away from the offending hand and felt a real blush growing across her cheeks. How that did Shizuru _always_ manage to make her feel that way? It was simply inhuman, the way that she acted exactly the same around everyone, and yet managed to excite a reaction from Natsuki alone. "Are you ready to go?"

"We're not going far," Shizuru said, climbing onto the back of the motorcycle and wrapping her arms around Natsuki's waist. She leaned forward and whispered, "Why are you in such a hurry, Natsuki?"

Natsuki coughed and shoved her helmet back onto her head; she knew why she was in a hurry - and she needed to make sure that she said the words before she lost her nerve all together. She turned her keys once again and the Ducati roared back to life, tires screeching as Natsuki spun the bike around to go back the way that she'd come down the narrow side street that played host to the school. As she speed towards her destination, she knew that the only thing she was really doing was trying to put as much distance between herself and the woman clinging to her back. She was afraid of what she knew she had to say to Shizuru, because she wasn't sure that Shizuru would understand it.

Kyohime had no trouble coming out, after all.

Natsuki closed her eyes against the longing to see her own child, for Duran had been a part of her life for almost as long as she cared to remember, and the fact that she'd suddenly realized her powers once more meant that she should be able to see the wolf once more.

Duran wouldn't come. He refused to come when she called him, and Natsuki was sure she why. She had to fix the fences before they rotted away completely.

The park was deserted when Natsuki pulled her motorcycle into the few parking spaces. There was no meter, and that worried Natsuki, for she wasn't sure that a parking citation was worth the headache she was about to endure. "We should stick close to the bike, in case we have to move it," She commented as she stowed her helmet on the seat.

"Good idea." Shizuru said.

They walked to a nearby bench in silence, Natsuki taking the time to sweep the dead leaves out of the way before they sat down. The park was showing the season as the sky was, the leaf-less trees reaching up like clawing fingers into the darkly overcast sky. Natsuki shivered despite her jacket as she stretched. "I hate this season."

"You are a summer child, Natsuki, it makes sense that you would dislike the cold," Shizuru said with a hit of amusement. She'd produced the two lunch boxes that Natsuki had left in the motorcycle's storage compartment from her bag and opened the top of one. She smiled and handed it to Natsuki, along with a pair of chopsticks that Natsuki had never seen before.

"You love it though," Natsuki mused. She picked at her food, flipping things over and inspecting a bit of egg before popping it into her mouth. "December birthday."

Shizuru nodded.

"It's coming up soon," Natsuki added. She leaned back against the cool metal of the bench. "Do you want anything in particular?"

Shizuru shook her head, "I'm sure that you will surprise me as you always do." She carefully folded her napkin into her lap and started in on her own food.

"Shizuru..." Natsuki said quietly. She set her lunchbox down on the bench beside her. "What's happened to us?"

Shizuru looked confused. "I'm not sure I understand your meaning, Natsuki."

Natsuki sighed. "Ever since this business with Nao and the elements started, I feel as though we're falling apart. I can't help what someone else feels towards me, and I don't feel the same way towards her - I just can't reject her. We've all seen what happens when someone's most precious person rejects them; I don't want to make anyone go through that again."

Shizuru was silent, her hands clenched in her lap. Natsuki watched her warily and tried not to look as though she was ready to fight. They had been building up to this point for so long that Natsuki was positive that there was only one possible outcome to this argument. She hated that idea, more than anything else at the moment. She didn't want to lose this, her perfect life, for the chance that something could go horribly wrong. Nothing was going to go wrong, she was positive, but she was so scared. She kept her face as blank as she could as she met Shizuru's gaze evenly.

"I think that Natsuki is not telling me everything." Shizuru said at length.

Natsuki looked away. She knew that she should have said something when the initial act happened, but she'd been afraid then, as she was now. "Perhaps," she shook her head. "I may not want to say it, Shizuru."

Shizuru frowned, "Your inaction leads me to believe the situation to be far worse that it is, Natsuki. I'm going out of my mind with worry, trying to think of what could be eating you up inside so much that you feel as though we're falling to pieces." She put a hand on Natsuki's shoulder, and then let it drift to her chin, tilting her face around, "Look at me, Natsuki. What's bothering you?"

Natsuki met the steady gaze with defiant eyes. She almost didn't want to tell Shizuru, to keep her in suspense until it killed them both. That, however, was a rather poor idea, when Natsuki considered it further, for the chances that they would come back were far lower than they'd been in the past. They were fighting this evil for their very lives, and it would not do to simply throw them away. No, simply going on would be the best option now. "When Nao confessed to me her suspicions about why she'd been able to summon her elements once more, she confessed a lot more than that. She did something that I am still struggling to understand. I desperately need to know what she was thinking, but I just... can't ask her. It's so strange, but I feel like I understood why she did it, why she let herself slip that one time. Her control is so perfect, Shizuru, better than even yours at times; I was so shocked that I just let it happen, I didn't think that it would do any harm. I love you more than anyone else in the whole world." She rambled on and on, realizing that Shizuru had probably stopped listening by now. It was only a matter of time now, before the blow up. Natsuki braced herself, knowing that it was the love she felt that was keeping her rooted to the spot and nothing more.

Anyone else would have run away by now.

"Shizuru?" Natsuki questioned.

"What did that - _whore_ - do to you?" Shizuru demanded her voice low and clam. Angry. Natsuki sighed; she'd been hoping to avoid this.

"Sealed the deal with a kiss, you'd say. Just as you did, all those years ago." Natsuki leaned back and tried not to look too wary of her lover. "You got to me first, you know; you'll always be there."

Shizuru was silent, accepting.

But still angry, so very very angry, Natsuki knew.


	26. Chapter 26

**Passages, Chapter Twenty Six**

_Author's note - So I took a crash course on how to be a psychopath and watched all of Code Geass - and then I learned what an epic love can feel like while watching Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha (and A's). Beautiful stories, both of these universes are. I liked Nanoha more, but that was just because it was a Mai-Otome-Fate/Stay Night-Card Captor Sakura-Sailor Moon-Pokemon fusion. The best kind. :D _

_Also, this chapter is hereby renamed 'The Epic Bowling Chapter of Plot Advancement' because of the crazy fucking hoops I had to go through to get my Japanese professor's assistant (a recent import) to explain to me how bowling works in Japan. Her English is about as wonky as my Japanese, so between the two of us had a very interesting discussion how just HOW MUCH one can run by computer. Bowling in Japan is very busy, and from what Suzuki-sensei told me, you can actually reserve lanes in advance without it being a birthday party - but you don't always get your lanes. Nao deals with this quite nicely._

also, wtf is up with the new document manager? I hate it. Always inserting question marks in where I don't need them.

* * *

_I'm worried for Nao, something tells me that this is not going to end well for her; even though that means that it will not end well for me also. Jun keeps on giving me these long looks as I sit looking out the window sighing. He doesn't understand what's happening to his family, the one thing that he's ever wanted. We're falling apart, and as much as I try and stick us back together, I don't think that we can simply go back to normal when this fore is defeated, the way that we could last time. But even that time, when you really think about it, was an illusion. We were given another chance at life that many of us did not deserve, and I want to say that we have truly risen to the occasion. The only problem is that now we're faced with the same sort of enemy with no real way of fighting it. _

_Back then we were teenagers with nothing solid that we could lose. Now the stakes are so, so much higher. _

_I worry that we might be forgetting just how high the stakes really are, because we're too lost in the small details of what is really going on in our lives. We're so focused on the little things to imagine the big picture. If we die this time, we're not coming back until the carnival starts anew and our souls are reborn into the cycle._

_Somehow, I think that we're supposed to be dead right now, that Mai somehow managed to alter the carnival enough to make it so that we could live and love on in this life time. _

_Maybe that is why everything is so messed up now._

_At any rate, Mai's still missing and I've no one solid to talk to about my fears for the future. Or what I'm going to do about the royal mess I've made of my friendships. _

_Nao is still mistakenly in love with me and fostering the delusion that I am the most important person in the world to her. I don't know how to fix that without sending Nao into some sort of homicidal rampage similar to the one that Shizuru went into when she thought that I'd rejected her. I need to tread carefully there, or I'm going to get bitten in the ass by something that I desperately want to ignore._

_Shizuru's still convinced that somehow the Obsidian Lord and Munakata Shiho are in cahoots to make our lives miserable. I know that the Obsidian Lord can never be gone for good, because an entity like that simply doesn't die, but the idea that he's in league with Shiho of all people seems a little odd. I agree that Shiho wasn't telling me everything when I met with her to speak about the Ikusahime legend; as Midori's own version of events is far more detailed and accurate to what we are going though at the moment; but I genuinely think that she simply wants to be left alone. Her beloved did betray her, after all, and married her worst enemy. I cannot think of anything that could make a person bear a grudge better than that. We Japanese are famous for just that, after all. We carry the wrongdoings of events long past in our psyches until they eat away at us._

_Some of us have spent our whole lives consumed by revenge. I was lucky to escape that. Really I was._

_Nao's proposed that since we can't all meet at Mai's place, that we should find somewhere else to talk. She picked a public bowling alley, as it would make sense for a large group of us to gather without turning too many heads. I think it's a bad idea, for we're exposing civilians to a large group of us in one place, almost baiting the enemy to come and get us. I hope that she's right about this being a good idea, because we've got no one to watch Jun, and so he's coming with us. _

_I hope to god that we're not going to get attacked._

_I don't know how I'll explain it to Jun._

* * *

_Same time._

Yuuki Nao checked her watch one more time and frowned. There was a birthday party at the bowling alley and the computer that was used for lane reservation said that there were no lanes available for close to an hour. People were going to start arriving soon and she had no idea what she was going to tell them, since her brilliant idea had fallen through. She'd called in advance, too, and had been promised that at the designated meeting time, only half the lanes had been reserved.

Nao bit her lip, and shoved her hands into her jacket pockets. She had to figure something out, and quickly, or else they were going to wind up in some tiny karaoke room trying to deal with the lack of space on top of the lack of breathable air. She had an idea how to get the annoyingly Americanized bowling stewards to listen to her – but she seriously thought that she had more self-respect than to stoop that low. But considering that ever since she'd consulted the computer they'd been trying to shoo her towards the door in that amazingly non-confrontational way that the Japanese were so famous for, she decided that it might just be worth it to mess with them a little.

"Excuse me," Nao said, extracting a hand from her pocket and fixing the nearest bowling steward with an angry glare. "I telephoned barely three hours ago, and I was informed by the manager that there would be two lanes free right now." She fixed the man with her best predatory stare and was suddenly grateful for the fact that after work she'd undone the buttons on her shirt to a point where she could count on sex appeal as a weapon. She hated doing things like this, because it reminded her, once again of all the reasons why she hated men in general. "I was wondering, since I have a large group of people that are going to be assembling on your doorstep in a few minutes, if there was any way that there could be a lane or two free in... say... half an hour?" Nao stared hard at the man, her nails digging into the soft flesh on his shoulder with a relish that Nao had not felt since those times in junior high, when she was going after men for being the lecherous pigs that they all were. She could get used to this, for men were so much easier to manipulate than the women that Nao spent her life struggling to please.

She had to get what she wanted here, however, because she did not want the embarrassment of having to explain to anyone, Kuga in particular, that she had failed in completing so simple a task. She leaned forward, practically touching the man's ear as she whispered in that low, sultry voice that she'd discovered to open far more doors than it closed. "It would not be in your best interest to deny me this," she purred. "Do not force me to do something that you'd later regret." She squeezed harder, the quiet trickle of liquid under her nails telling her that she'd finally made her mark on the man for the time being.

She guessed that his wife would not appreciate the marks any more than he would in the morning. Nao bit back a laugh, knowing that her part in this play was to be the temptress, and then the seductress. She could play this role in her sleep, even though the degradation of the actions was almost too much for her to handle most of the time.

The bowling steward reached up to loosen the collar on his brightly colored short, his brow was covered in sweat. Nao felt her smirk deepen as he nodded weakly, "Thank you."

The man bowed slightly and raced back behind the counter as Nao inspected her nails. She smiled, and blew him a kiss. She did love playing the game, and she was so, so good at it.

Still, her skill at the game was only matched by her prey's seeming ability to ignore it all together. No amount of skill could explain how she was unable to catch the one fly in her web that she so desperately wanted to sample.

Nao frowned and stalked over to the computer that handled lane reservations once more and lazily plugged the information that their group would need into the machine, content to wait for the others to arrive now, before she acted once again.

* * *

"Are you sure that this is a good idea?" Natsuki asked as she helped Jun into his thick winter jacket that they'd gotten him the previous year. She was a little alarmed to see that the jacket still fit the boy, as she would have expected the boy to grow at least a little around the arms and shoulders. Perhaps Shizuru had gotten him a new coat at the end of the season sales last year and she'd somehow missed it. That could have explained why the coat still fit him so well. Jun had definitely grown in the past year. The notches on the doorframe into his bedroom clearly showed at least three inches of growth.

It _had_ to be a new coat.

Shizuru paused in the process of pulling one of her shoes on, and looked up at Natsuki with a rather unreadable expression on her face. "I don't see why not," she said simply before going back to the apparently very complicated task of pulling on one shoe and then the other.

Natsuki watched her move with the practiced motions of someone who had years of experience under their belt. Shizuru wasn't telling her something, but Natsuki knew what it was that was left unsaid between them. She'd dropped Shizuru off at the school after their lunch time conversation earlier, and Natsuki knew that she would have had to be a fool to not notice what was eating at Shizuru. She didn't know how to fix that, however. She knew that if Shizuru was left alone with Nao, they'd come to have words, maybe even exchange blows, but Natsuki was sure that as long as Nao thought that Natsuki was her most precious person, there was no danger of Nao getting killed by a rather irate Shizuru. There were just too many risks and Shizuru, while a bit of a daredevil, also respected the fact that there were certain things in life that were inevitable.

"It's just that with so many of us together it seems as though we're just asking the enemy to attack us," Natsuki muttered as she leaned down next to Shizuru to retrieve her boots. They were still being discrete as they could about the attacks around Jun, but he was a perceptive child and Natsuki knew that it was only a matter of time before he decided to ask what exactly it was that was bothering his parents to much. She didn't know what she would tell him then, and her sinking suspicion was that no matter what she said to him, it would not be enough. She didn't have a lie convincing enough to cover this.

Shizuru shrugged and Natsuki pulled on her boots. Shizuru was making sure that Jun's sneakers were tied properly. "Are we ready to go?" Natsuki asked, standing once again.

Shizuru smiled at her, and Jun giggled. "Yes!" he shouted, practically jumping up and down with excitement. Natsuki felt a pang of guilt as she picked up her keys and led them out of the apartment. They'd been doing next to nothing special for Jun these past few weeks, more so since Mai'd gone missing. There was just no way that they could really know when their next moment together would be. This would have to make up for it, even though Nao would be there and Natsuki was positive that she'd be spending most of her time protecting Shizuru and Nao from themselves and simply forcing them to avoid conflict.

It was all she could do, really.

They headed up the side street towards the train station. Nao lived across town, and so they'd all agreed to meet somewhere in the middle - which meant traveling into the heart of the city to the one place that Natsuki had never expected Nao to propose for a meeting space. It was a public place, which annoyed Natsuki, for they would not have the privacy that they so desperately needed while talking about HiME business.

The train came quickly and Jun excitedly stared out the window as it lurched forward, heading into the city. He was such a good kid, really, and Natsuki couldn't help but swell with pride as he turned himself around after a few long moments of excited chatter to Shizuru and sat quietly. He was finally getting the hang of being on the train, after four years of working with him on his over excitability when it came to being on trains.

"Kuga!" Someone called, and Natsuki let go of the hand rail she was holding and turned to look around. Two people had just gotten onto the train, and Natsuki found herself grinning at them. She hadn't seen Tokiha Takumi in a very long time, since he generally didn't come to the HiME meetings, and Natsuki had not had a lot of cause to hang around Mai's restaurant during the lunch time rush when Takumi covered the kitchen so that Mai could get some sleep.

"Ah," Shizuru said, moving closer to Jun so that Takumi could sit down on the train's seat beside her. The two of them exchanged a look after that, but both of them knew that Takumi's heart was still on the mend after the numerous surgeries that he'd undergone as a young adult. The stress of his sister suddenly going missing was bound to bring him to a state of constant stress that had to but strain on his heart that hadn't existed since before he'd gotten the surgeries in the first place. Taking care of him was paramount, because Mai would never forgive them if something happened to them. "Takumi, Akira, we weren't expecting you to show up to Yuuki's little extravaganza."

Natsuki flinched at the way that Shizuru said Nao's name. She should have known better than to think that she could actually get away with having the two of them in the same place. This was going to end poorly, she just knew it.

Akira grabbed the handrail next to Natsuki and frowned, "I don't think it's a good idea."

Natsuki nodded her agreement, knowing that their reasons were very different but the end result would be the same. Disaster.

She shook her head when Akira started to talk once again, jerking her head in Jun's direction. They couldn't talk about these things until they were sure that he was properly distracted. Akira nodded her assent and they passed the rest of the trip into the city in silence. There was nothing for them to really talk about, they were HiME, they had a duty to fight this battle through and make sure that nothing bad happened in the process. Their spiritual leader - as Mai sort of was, the more that Natsuki thought about it, had gone missing. They needed her, desperately, for without Mai, they were just a rag-tag bunch of warriors with nothing to show for their work. Mai, somehow, through her presence, made everything seem to work in such a way that Natsuki felt as though she could actually fill the official capacity of leader without much difficulty. Mai was the fire to Natsuki's ice, and it had to stay that way if they were to ever get anything from the massive amounts of fighting that they would most likely have to see through before this thing was done.

The train arrived at the central station, and Natsuki helped Shizuru herd Jun out of the train and onto the busy street. They both took one of his hands and lead him the three blocks to the bowling alley's address - as per the directions on Akira's phone.

"You guys really fit the part," Akira muttered to Natsuki after a block of walking.

Natsuki frowned, not really understanding what she was talking about. "What do you mean?" she asked.

Akira shrugged, the gesture making her hair fall into her eyes and obscure her face. It made her look, once again, like a boy. Over and over again, Shizuru had joked to Natsuki about how it was rather impossible to tell that Akira had been a girl for most of their time in school, but as the carnival started to hit a higher note she'd started to notice some signs that implied, pretty heavily, that Okuzaki Akira was a girl. "You just look like the perfect family, that's all," she said at length.

Natsuki didn't know how to respond to that, for there were so many biting retorts to such a well-intended compliment like that. They were far from perfect. They were broken in the worst way, and Natsuki didn't know how to come out and say that. She sighed, dropping Jun's hand and causing him to look up at her with a confused expression on his face. "I guess so," she said, looping her fingers behind her head and stretching a little.

Akira made a non-committal sound and they pressed on. The bowling alley loomed into view and Natsuki's eyes narrowed as she saw Nao waiting outside for them.

"Ah, Nao!" Takumi smiled. They'd been in the same class in school for the whole of their high school career, so Natsuki assumed that they must have had some sort of relationship outside of the cool indifference that Nao tried to force on everyone that she interacted with.

Natsuki sighed; this was going to be a very long, very stressful meeting.

* * *

She didn't understand this. It was so stupidly ridiculous. They were bowling, of all things, when they could have been doing so much more. She narrowed her eyes and watched Yuuki with the strange sort of twisted interest that she watched Natsuki with most of the time. There was just something about that girl that made her so very, very angry.

She actually understood, on some primal level that Yuuki was not actually stomping on her territory, she was just trying to sort out her feelings towards someone who had played a very important role in her life for a long time. She could remember her own crises of faith - in those months after the carnival, where she wasn't sure what Natsuki was doing, sleeping in the same bed with her and yet refusing to touch her.

They'd shared what they knew, all of them. She'd done her part and rambled on in front of Kanzaki Reito about how he was sporadically being possessed by the Obsidian Lord, and she'd explained her theory on why the entity was not dead. What she found most intriguing, however, was that he didn't disagree with her. If anything, he seemed to _agree_ with her allocations and was trying to find a way to capitalize upon them.

"This isn't his fight," Kanzaki said, looking far more tired than Shizuru had ever seen him. He ran his hands through his hair. "He doesn't know what's going on - for the carnival is always supposed to end with the winner becoming his wife - no one expected that Mai would make the selfless decision that she did. And now you all are alive when technically the legend dictates that you should be dead."

Midori had objected to that, going on into a long explanation of myth and legend that she had not bothered to listen to. Kazuya and his wife were giggling behind their hands about something, and the action was making Natsuki's brow twitch in that truly adorable way that it did from time to time when Natsuki was really frustrated. She smiled politely at Midori and turned her attention to the one person that she actually interested at this meeting.

Yuuki, from her observation, was also fairly bored with the whole thing, for Midori did tend to go on a bit. After a few long moments, she caught the redhead's gaze. Their eyes met and she could practically see the sparks flying back and forth. This was what she wanted, she knew, this battle was the one thing that could perhaps make things go back to the way they were before.

"Natsuki, take my turn," she said quietly to the woman sitting next to her. She met Natsuki's questioning gaze with a pensive look of her own. She knew what she was asking, and Natsuki would not agree to it. Still, she had to do it, and her gaze was resolute as Natsuki gave her a look that warned her against dangerous actions.

Natsuki didn't understand why she did this, for it was something that she barely understood herself. Kiyohime had told her long ago that this was what she needed to do, protect Natsuki at all costs, or Natsuki would disappear into the either when she was least expecting it.

Natsuki had to understand that she wasn't going to do anything, unless Yuuki pushed her to action. Even then, putting her down would not take long. Natsuki really should know better than to push her towards something that they both knew would really present no problem.

Their gaze met one last time, and she was certain that Natsuki would not stop her unless she had to.

She hoped that it would not come to that.

She didn't want to fight Yuuki if she didn't have to, after all, the girl was practically family to Natsuki and it would make her lover sad if she somehow killed the younger girl.

Natsuki nodded and picked up the purple ball that she'd picked out at the beginning of their game and walked to the end of the lane. She cast a final look back over her shoulder before turning her attention back to what she was doing.

Shizuru paused and placed a hand on Yuuki's shoulder and jerked her head towards the bathrooms. She left then, knowing that Yuuki would follow her in good time. No one else would pick up on the fact that they were at odds with each other any more than usual. They were, after all, very good actors, the two of them.


	27. Chapter 27

**Passages Chapter Twenty Seven**

AN: So yeah, when I mentioned last update that I'd watched Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, I did forget to mention that IT ATE MY SOUL. I'm so so sorry you guys, but seriously, I had a choice between a happy relationship and a relationship that I seem dead set to destroy. That and I have this massive crush on Fate that's really rather embarrassing when you think about it. Mizuki Nana's voice is really hot. I should not have this problem... as I usually fall for the tall, dark and bishoujo variety of anime girls.

So I started this document about a month ago, and then today I was all, "Fuck it," and had a beer and wrote this update for y'all. I hope you enjoy it. It is still, technically illegal for me to drink.

* * *

_Sometimes, it is the waiting that kills me. I can deal with the slow build and constant pressure, but the waiting for the right moment to act is what always gets me in the end. I cannot stand not knowing where I will be or what I will be doing in a day, a week, a month from now. It seems as though we're stuck in the middle of one of those situations now, where I am going stir crazy just trying to figure out what will happen next._

_I swear our lives are like some bad Korean drama; all drama, all the time, with very little lull in the action for something that could be considered peace of mind._

_We're sitting on something so big, so dramatic and painful that I know when it comes I will have no way to guard those I love against it. I will be powerless to protect them from this new foe because I am too afraid of what exactly I feel for the people close to me._

_And yet still I fight on. I know not what the future brings, and yet I still push forward into each new battle knowing that I might not come back._

_I wonder if the fact that I never really know if Shizuru will be with me or against me in these fights is really what keeps me going. I am constantly looking for a fight; it seems to be the norm these days. _

_I have to be ready to take her down, even though I never want to even consider that concept. I can't think of anything worse than that, and I know that she will think me a horrible person for writing these thoughts down somewhere in the distant future when she finally gets around to reading them. Still, I have to be ready. I can't risk the world for something that I'm not prepared to die again for._

_-_

_Three Hours Later._

The woman's bathroom was quiet and secluded - away from the chaos of the rest of the bowling alley. It wasn't clean, exactly, but it was the sort of clean that came from public restrooms. There were two sinks and three toilet stalls, rather small for such a large establishment, and the dim lighting over head would not serve either of them well in a fight.

Nao allowed herself into the room and then closed the door with a snap, her fingers turning the lock without even thinking. She didn't want any interruptions, and she doubted that Fujino did either. Nao was everything if not a courteous opponent. "What do you want, Fujino?" She demanded of the dim room before her. She could hear Fujino's breathing, but she could not see the red-eyed woman. Nao supposed that that was for the best, as she did not really want to look at her at all. Looking at Fujino only made this situation worse and Nao had no desire to aggravate it any further. She could prove herself to Kuga on her own time - she didn't need Fujino to fuck everything up with her insanely overprotective attitudes towards everything related to Kuga Natsuki. She shook her head slightly, allowing her elements to materialize on her fingertips as she waited for the inevitable blow to fall. There would be no dodging it this time.

Fujino was silent; her breathing coming in small even breaths that told Nao that she was trying to calm herself down. That was a good sign, she reasoned, for that it meant that Fujino still had something of her sanity about her person - which meant restraint that Nao had to count on to win this battle once and for all.

The blood red blade cut down out of nowhere and Nao found herself pressed up against the wall with her neck in very close proximity to a blade that she'd hoped to never be on the receiving end of again. This time Julia would not come, nor would that monstrous creature that protected Fujino. The only thing that would happen is that they would all vanish into nothing and leave that adorable little boy that Kuga called her son would be left without parents and alone in the world. They didn't even know if they'd get the chance to come back this time. Nao was taking no chances and she held up her hands in surrender, her face screwed up as she tried to keep from screaming.

"What did you do to my Natsuki?" Fujino ground out. Her face was completely hidden by that thick mane of hair that was usually kept very well controlled bun at the small of Fujino's neck. Nao decided that she didn't like not being able to see Fujino's eyes. Her eyes were the best indicator of her sanity and not being able to see them was almost as bad as the insistent press of Fujino's blade against her neck.

Nao swallowed and tried to back away from the blade that was making it very difficult for her to breathe and was cutting into the fabric of her high-necked work shirt. She was suddenly glad that she'd buttoned it up after practically molesting the poor manager of the bowling alley to make sure that they got the lanes that they'd been promised. The collar provided her a little protection that she would not have had otherwise against such an attack and Nao had to admit that she was grateful for her forward thinking. Still, it was an expensive shirt and she didn't want Fujino to ruin it if she wasn't going to follow through with her threats and actually finish the deed that Nao was goading her into doing.

She raised her eyebrows at Fujino, as if daring her to do it. "Can't act, can you, Fujino?" She was pushing it, but Nao was no fool. She knew what she had to do to get out of this. Get to her point, as Kuga had most likely done before her, that they were all connected now. "You know that if you cut me down, that you will go with me. And your precious Na-tsu-ki as well." She spat Kuga's name out with a scowl. It didn't feel right, saying Kuga's name that way, but Nao said it anyway. She had to push as many as Fujino's buttons as possible.

Fujino lowered the blade slightly, just enough so that Nao could breathe properly and fixed the redhead with an angry glare. "You have a point, Yuuki." A rather unhappy frown crossed her face for a moment, before it turned upwards into a truly sadistic looking sneer. "I would love to test your theory, however. If we were not playing with something so precious as Natsuki's life, I would cut you down like the pest you are - just to prove you a fool once and for all."

Nao bowed her head a little bit. "You realize the gravity of the situation then, Fujino." She almost laughed, for this was just so perfect. Fujino was powerless to act, and Nao was powerless to rebel against the blood-red blade pressed into her neck. "What do you propose we do about it?"

The tension in the room seemed only to rise as the two of them stared at each other. Nao was not going to back down, and she was quite positive that Fujino would do nothing of the sort. The sandy-haired woman, had had a fairly traditional upbringing after all, it wouldn't make sense for her to simply stand aside and allow Nao to walk all over her in the metaphorical sense that Nao was pissing on her territory.

Nao closed her eyes and swallowed as slowly as she could. She didn't want to accidentally slit her own throat in such a reflex action. Her mouth was dry anyway.

Fujino looked honestly pensive for a moment, before she lowered the blade completely. She leaned against it, frowning. "We cannot do anything, Yuuki," she said, her voice reflecting the gravity of her words. Nao wondered just what exactly it was that she was thinking as she forced herself to say these words, for it was so clear that she was struggling to get them out in any way that made sense to the rest of the world. Nao knew that admitting defeat was not something that Fujino would do, but her tone seemed to suggest that she was giving up.

Nao opened her mouth to say something, but the blade of Fujino's element snapped up and dipped even closer to Nao's throat it had before and Nao wisely closed her mouth.

Fujino would not look at her as she continued speaking. Nao guessed that this was just too painful a lie for even someone such as Fujino to spin. "While I do not like you, I will not deny that Natsuki is an important person in your life, and has been for a very long time. She has been there for you when you did not deserve it - when I tried to stop her, when everyone told her to stay way from you. I do not like you, and I never will for what you've put Natsuki through in the past."

Nao shook her head. Fujino was gearing up to forgive her. She couldn't believe it, it was just so surreal. "Don't say anything," she said at length. She didn't want Fujino's pity, nor did she want forgiveness from a cold-blooded murderer. This whole thing was so hypocritical that Nao had to struggle to keep the hysterical laughter continued within her mind, for she was dangerously close to losing her cool. "I understand what you mean, and I am grateful that you have decided that it is better to actually examine the facts before you blindly rush out into battle. You are not as brash as your counterpart."

Fujino smiled, actually smiled, at that. Nao wondered if she was going to be sick, for the smile seemed so completely out of place on that alien face that had plagued her nightmares for almost fifteen years.

"Do not think that I give you this chance lightly, Yuuki." Fujino said with the air of someone commenting on the weather. "Natsuki has told me as much as she can, and I'm not fool enough to ignore the writing on the wall. You would do well to remember that Natsuki is _mine_, however."

Nao shrugged, choosing not to answer Fujino's unspoken question. She wouldn't give in that easily, but Nao was not above saving herself. Romance, or anything between herself and Kuga that still needed to get worked out, could come later.

The door of the bathroom burst open then, the telltale sign of Kuga's guns could be heard from the other side of the door.

"What the fuck are you two doing?!" A very irate, and from the looks of it, frustrated Kuga demanded. Her hair was falling into her eyes and Nao could tell that she'd kicked the door a few times by the way that she was favoring her left foot rather than her right. The door was thick, and it seemed as though just one kick had not been enough for Kuga to take out all of her anger, before pulling out her elements and simply shooting the lock.

_Funny, we didn't hear it at all..._

Fujino's blade was removed from her throat in an instant and she honestly looked taken aback that Kuga had come in at all. Nao was reminded; once again, that Fujino and Kuga's union was something that wasn't really anything to write home about. They were just as broken and fucked up as the next couple, it was just that they hid it better behind the walls of a loving family that seemed perfect in the eyes of everyone around them.

Nao knew better, Nao knew perfection when she saw it. There was no way that two dishonest people such as Fujino and Kuga could keep up the façade of their relationship without a lot more compromise on both their parts. They couldn't control each other's lives, after all.

"Just working out some differences, eh, Fujino?" Nao said, raising an eyebrow in Fujino's direction and grinning rather wickedly.

Kuga looked from Nao to Fujino, kicking the door to the bathroom closed behind her, not lowering her guns.

Fujino nodded and allowed her element to fade completely from view. "We have come to an understanding, Natsuki, there's nothing to worry about."

Kuga, for her part, did not look all that convinced. Still, Nao stepped forward and held up her hands in surrender. "This is what comes from being on edge constantly Kuga," she pushed one of Kuga's guns aside and smirked. Jabbing Kuga in the chest with her finger, she leaned forward to the point where she was endangering her own personal health. "You need to get laid."

She backed away and brushed around Kuga, leaving the bathroom and heading back to take her turn in their game. Kuga and Fujino could work out their own problems.

"Hey Nao, where did you go?" Mikoto asked, chewing pensively on a pocky stick.

"Just had to pee," Nao said, leaning back in her chair and stealing one of Mikoto's pocky sticks. "Yeah, that's it." She glanced over at the little boy sandwiched between Suzushiro and Kanzaki Reito, hoping that he would not lose his parents when this whole conflict was done and over.

-

"We're lying to ourselves when we say we're happy, aren't we, Natsuki?" Shizuru asked, leaning back against the dirty wall of the bathroom and folding her arms across her chest.

Natsuki didn't know what to say, she couldn't trust Shizuru to not lie to her about something like this, and Nao had taken her leave at what was by far the correct time to get while the getting was good. Now Natsuki had to pick up whatever pieces where left from the confrontation between Nao and Shizuru.

Still, Shizuru was correct when she said that they were lying to each other. They weren't happy, they were falling apart, and they couldn't seem to move past the part of their relationship where they truly learned to trust each other. Everything had been going so well, before this whole mess had started. Natsuki didn't want to deal with it, she never did.

"I don't..." Natsuki really didn't know what to say, and she wasn't about to admit that to Shizuru. "I don't think that we can make a judgment on it. We're not objective observers."

Shizuru smiled at her and Natsuki felt her heart rise. There was something, no matter how torn and conflicted she felt about Shizuru, about that smile that made her so much more happy than anything else in this world. She'd been to the next one only briefly and already she knew that there was nothing that she could want more than that smile. "Always so scientific and direct, Natsuki."

"Always." Natsuki smiled in response.

They stood there in silence for a few moments, Natsuki's guns faded way into nothing as soon as she was not concentrating on keeping them materialized and she stood there, feeling completely confused on what was the best course of action to take. She couldn't simply walk away, because they both had things that needed to be said to each other, but Natsuki did not know how to make the first move. She hadn't done this, hadn't been caught in this particular corner for quite some time, and she'd quite forgotten the mental anguish that came along with it.

Shizuru smiled, "I hope that Yuuki takes our turns for us, or else I'm going to loose to Haruka, and I don't think that I could stomach that."

Natsuki giggled, feeling suddenly as though a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. Of course they'd turn to humor to alleviate the feeling that they'd somehow fucked this situation up far worse than it had been before; humor was safe and not going to potentially get anyone killed.

_So much for real conversations,_ Natsuki thought, offering Shizuru her hand.

Shizuru took it and Natsuki pulled her close. "We can't keep doing this."

"I don't think that it will happen again, Natsuki." Shizuru said.

Natsuki said nothing in response to that comment, for a snort of disbelief would not get her the answers that she wanted from Shizuru. Instead she simply sat there and breathed in Shizuru's scent, allowing the feeling of familiarity and contentment to wash over her. They were heading into something big, it was better to have everyone on the same team. Of that, at least, Natsuki was sure of.

Natsuki's phone buzzed in her pants pocket and she fished it out, leaning on Shizuru's shoulder as she opened the waiting e-mail. "It's from Mai," she said quietly. "She's in Fuuka - at the school."

Shizuru frowned and plucked the phone from Natsuki's fingers. "What is Tokiha doing there?" She asked, scanning the e-mail.

Natsuki didn't know, but it made sense, to some extent that Mai would turn up in a place like that after vanishing without a word. Somehow, she got the feeling that there was more going on than met the eye; something that Mai didn't think was a good idea to include in an e-mail. E-mails, after all, could be intercepted.

"We should show this to the others." Natsuki said, taking her phone back and sliding it back into her pocket. She took Shizuru's hand and led her back to where the others were waiting.

"Mama!" Jun said, jumping up into Natsuki's arms as soon as they came close enough for him to notice them. He clung to her as she hugged him, "You left so fast, I didn't know where you went."

Natsuki patted his back, "Don't worry, I just went to go talk to Shizuru for a few minutes."

Over Jun's shoulder, she could see Nao chewing thoughtfully on a piece of pocky. It figured that the red head would try to disassociate herself with the entire incident, that was just her style. Natsuki would yell at her later, yes, yell, that was the right word for it.

Natsuki set Jun down and pulled her phone out of her pocket, opening up the e-mail and tossing it to Nao. "I just got that."

Nao paged through the message, "So Mai's up in the land of Fuuka again? What on earth attracted her to that place again?" She handed the phone off to Yukino who leaned back so that both Kanzaki and Suzushiro could read it at the same time. Their expressions grew grave as the phone was passed around the circle.

Natsuki closed her eyes and patted Jun's head as he attacked himself to her midsection. Weaving her fingers through his thick curls, she asked the group at large., "Dunno, fancy a trip up there to find out?" She didn't know how she'd explain it to her boss, but she was pretty sure that she could take some vacation time to go and collect a friend who'd been reported missing to the police a few weeks ago. Natsuki knew that they should all go to Fuuka, for perhaps Himeno would have some answers that Natsuki had not been able to gather on her own. They could all use some more information, and it seemed that all roads, as the ancient adage went, lead to Fuuka Gakuen once more.


	28. Chapter 28

**Passages Chapter Twenty Eight**

AN: The story is starting to pick up the pace, and we're off to Fuuka once more. I was wondering, where exactly is Fuuka? The reason I ask is because I'm still not entirely sure where this story takes place, and I need to do train and travel time estimates for one rather annoyed Kuga next chapter and I want to make sure that I don't fuck it up.

One could say that it makes sense for this story to take place in Tokyo somewhere, but at the same time, Tokyo seems like it's almost too big a city for Shizuru and Natsuki to settle down in. They seem the sort to need their space, as it were. So, no Tokyo for you, readers. I established that Natsuki, Mai and Shizuru all went to college in the same place, and I'm not sure if I ever specified that they left wherever it was that they went to college. For all intensive purposes, they're living somewhere in the Kansai region of Japan, perhaps near, but not in Kyoto.

So, where was Fuuka again?

* * *

_Finally, things are moving again. It's nice to have a clear purpose again, and we're gearing up to do something, which is good. I miss being able to say that I'm going to go make something different, and then make good on my promise. Being able to move once again will do that._

_We left the bowling alley with several clear goals in mind, and no real idea of how to achieve them. Mai would wait at the school in Fuuka for us to get there, but the challenge of arriving at such a hallowed battleground was not something that I wanted to face alone. Out of all of us, Nao and I have the easiest jobs to get away from for a few days. I can simply take the time from my vacation allowance, and Nao can pass it off as market research or something along those lines for the firm she works for. No one else is so lucky, for they have to work around schedules of others - Yukino and Shizuru are especially challenged by this, as they are working for others with very clear-cut schedules to begin with. I think that Shizuru's going to tell her school that a close relative has passed away and that she has to attend the funeral. That will get her at least until next week off, but after that, she's going to have to come back and work. _

_I hate lying like this. It makes me feel somehow dirty - but this is a battle that I can't very well avoid, let alone tell my bosses about. I spent a good portion of my childhood doing just that, and it just kept on creeping up on me, forcing my hand even when I wanted to stay slow and even in my actions._

_I don't know what awaits us at Fuuka. Everything in me warns that caution is the best weapon now, Mai's safe, which is what matters._

_Mai's safe and we know who our enemy is._

_She played me like a fool. _

_Apparently, it's easier than I thought it was._

-

Five hours later.

Natsuki dropped her travel bag onto the bed and began to rummage through her sock drawer, looking for a few salvageable pairs that she could bring with her. Most of her clothes were still in the wash, and while Shizuru had been able to wash all of their clothes, their apartment lacked a dryer and it would be tomorrow by the time many of her normal clothes were dry. She would have to simply make do with what was still clean. She moved on to the underwear drawer and carefully selects a few pieces of her collection that she doesn't care that much about and adds the lot to her bag. There was a good chance that these clothes would be bloodied and soiled, she didn't want to lose any of her favorite pieces to something like that.

Her collection was finally fully recovered from the deadly blow dealt to it early in the Carnival.

Natsuki, to this day, could not believe that she let Shizuru talk her into that. Her entire collection, destroyed, in a matter of minutes; it was an inhuman cruelty.

They were going to take the train, as driving to Fuuka was completely out of the question. Natsuki hated the idea of going back to Fuuka without her motorcycle, but that was a matter that she could take care of once she got there. She still had contacts in the city, and she didn't know if she was going to have to be doing any travel once she got there. For all she knew, she would just be going to collect Mai. They didn't even know if they were going to fight, but these things never turned out in their favor, so Natsuki was ready.

She had to be, because they were playing on uncertainty and an individual who was clearly not thinking straight at all. How else could someone, after nearly fifteen years, still harbor the same adolescent crush on someone who was clearly _not _interested in her at all? It was just so stupid, and Natsuki felt like a fool for missing the implications of such an action.

Natsuki clenched her fists around the spread of the bed, leaning forward and grinding her teeth. That little bitch had played her like only a professional could and Natsuki was so out of practice in reading people that she'd just let it pass all together. She could not believe that she'd missed that, completely.

She had to go to Fuuka; she had to confront that little girl who'd caused Mai so many problems while still at school. She'd called her boss an hour ago and had said that some family stuff had come up and that she was going to be away from the office for a few days. He was very understanding, as Natsuki rarely took time off for anything, and she was free and in the clear to be gone for as long as this mission took.

"Natsuki?" Shizuru stuck her head around the door, her hair falling in an arc behind her. Natsuki turned to look at her, and she walked into the room, her eyes curious and expression carefully blank. Natsuki hated it when Shizuru didn't betray her feelings with her face, as it made conversations between the two of them so much more difficult to follow. Natsuki was still, even after all these years, unaccustomed to speaking in metaphor. "You're packing already?"

Natsuki grunted, there was no reason to state the obvious, and it wasn't as though it was exactly a _strange_ idea for her to do something like this. She was just throwing things into a bag so that they could go when a plan was finally decided upon. She'd been doing it for years now, and Shizuru had never thought to question it before. "I want to be ready, because I'm not sure who's going and what that will make for a team, should we actually have to fight. I'd rather spend my time thinking of strategies or something..."

Shizuru smiled wisely and placed her hands on Natsuki's shoulders. "You want to go play video games with your son," she said knowingly. Her eyes sparkled with private amusement as she said the words and Natsuki felt her brow twitch slightly. She was about to get teased, and from the look in Shizuru's eyes, there was no way that she could avoid it. "Because it is somehow cathartic for you to shoot monsters in a game and you've been under a lot of pressure recently."

Natsuki never did really know how Shizuru managed to read her so well, for it always was slightly unnerving when Shizuru was able to simply pick a motive from a hat and be right on the money about why Natsuki was doing whatever it was that she was doing. She coughed into her hand and pulled Shizuru closer, resting her forehead on the taller woman's shoulder. "I don't know how to tell Jun that I might not come back, Shizuru." It was an honest confession, and one that Natsuki thought that the situation merited, as they'd been talking on such a light note. Natsuki did better in serious conversations, it was harder for her to get flustered when she was speaking frankly, and she needed to get those thoughts off of her chest if they were to be at all useful on this trip to Fuuka.

"What makes you think that you won't be coming back, Natsuki?" Shizuru said, her fingers weaving into Natsuki's hair as she held Natsuki's smaller form. "I won't let that happen, and neither will anyone else. No one gets killed this time, we promised."

Natsuki nodded, enjoying simply being held and comforted by Shizuru. There'd been so little contact between them recently that it was almost strange to be so close to Shizuru. It was nice and familiar, something that Natsuki could come back to time and time again and never feel as though Shizuru would reject her for being herself.

And yes, she did want to go kill things with Jun.

Natsuki straightened, her arms still looped around Shizuru's back. It didn't feel natural to let go just yet, so she didn't. "Have you figured out what you're going to say to your boss?"

Shizuru nodded, a bit of a grin crossing her face. Natsuki closed her eyes and shook her head; Shizuru had already made the call. Always efficient, that one; it was one of the things that Natsuki loved about her. "I said what Natsuki said, that I had a family emergency I had to take care of and I would need to take three of my allotted sick days to take care of the problem. That will give me, at least, time enough to make sure that no one will be dying while we're in Fuuka collecting Tokiha."

Natsuki grinned back at her. Shizuru had made the same mistake that everyone made from time to time when talking about Mai, forgetting that she was, indeed, married to Yuuichi Tate. Shizuru never made that mistake, but she'd done it twice today already. "She's married, now, Shizuru. Her last name is Tate." Natsuki could barely keep the amusement from her voice, she was finally able to pull one over on Shizuru, and Shizuru was really powerless to do anything about it, as she'd been in the wrong.

"So she is." Shizuru leaned forward and kissed Natsuki gently on the lips.

They didn't talk for a while after that.

-

"Kuga," Yuuki Nao hefted her overnight bag into a better position on her shoulder as she approached the dark haired figure on the train platform. They'd all agreed - everyone who could make it and get time off of work - to meet on the platform for the train that headed in the direction of Fuuka and their shared past. It didn't really shock Nao to see Kuga and Fujino holding hands in the shadow of a large advertisement, Jun standing next to them looking rather confused.

Nao's eyes narrowed; what were they thinking, bringing a child along on such a venture? Surely there was someone who could take care of him here. Kuga had neighbors, she'd met some of them, and Jun had to have _some_ friends at school that he could stay with.

Tokiha Takumi made his way up the steps to the platform just behind Nao and smiled at her before jogging ahead to speak to Kuga. Nao quickened her pace so that she could hear what was going on.

"Takumi's going to watch Jun for Kuga and Fujino," Nao jumped as a voice cut through the quiet sounds of the train station that was not quite awake yet. The tall, silent form of Okuzaki Akira had fallen into step beside her and she hadn't even noticed. Nao cursed quietly, for her reflexes were no where near as good as they had once been. She felt as though she was somehow not nearly as good at this whole 'magical-girl-super-hero' thing as she could have been. Then again, who was really judging, as the whole situation was completely unappealing to everyone.

Nao turned to Akira and narrowed her eyes. She was rather shocked that Akira - or even Takumi for that matter - wasn't insisting that the other come along. "He's not coming?"

Akira shook her head, her jaw jutting out in a steely resolve. They'd fought about this then, Nao realized with a private smirk. Trouble in paradise was always fun to tease the quiet girl about. "He's going to watch Arisa and Jun for us while we go. I don't want him near the fighting any more than Kuga and Fujino want Jun near it." There was something unspoken in her voice, an old resentment that Nao herself did not really recall. She knew that back during the carnival, when she'd been out of her mind with so many conflicting emotions, that she'd attacked Takumi to get to Mai.

Fujino had put her down, however. Mikoto had taken care of Akira's child.

"He does rather paint a target on his forehead, doesn't he?" Nao said quietly.

Akira looked appalled at her comment and stalked away.

Nao shrugged and came to stand next to Kuga, a slight wariness crossing her face as she met Fujino's expectant gaze. Natsuki was kneeling down, ruffling Jun's hair and telling him that she loved him.

It was all rather pathetically domestic, and Nao felt a wave of jealousy watching Kuga so plainly love someone that was not her. She knew that there was very little that she could do about the situation, as Jun was just a little boy that she found quite adorable when she was allowed to be near him. Both Kuga and Fujino were quite protective of him, and Nao was a very bad and corrupting influence.

"Ah, Yuuki, you got time off of work," Fujino's tone was like a challenge to act, but an innocent one. They were going to be careful around each other then, for neither of them wanted to lose the woman to their own foolishness. The incident at the bowling alley seemed to have made that, if not anything else, abundantly clear.

Nao shrugged. "I have a fairly flexible schedule, plus, they wanted me to go to Yokohama last month for market research and I simply put it off, so I can say that I'm doing research now." It was a lie, because Nao hated actually doing research, it was so easy to tell what kids wanted these days. They were no longer as complicated and hard to market to as they used to be. She just played the role of the good worker to keep her job. Sleeping her way through the office of young attractive people was just a bonus, when she thought about it, but at the same time, she couldn't help but think that she was somehow in the wrong these days.

She wanted something more, but she could not put into words what she wanted.

Fujino exhaled and put a hand on Nao's shoulder. Nao tried very hard not to flinch. "It's good to see that you have no qualms about lying to anyone."

"Says the woman who's still living a lie." Nao grunted, adjusting her overnight bag and grinning at Jun, who was looking at her with wide eyes. "Don't worry about your mom, kid," she said quietly, "She'll come back in one piece if it kills the rest of us."

Somehow, it felt good to say that.

-

The train ride was long, since the late hour meant that they had to take the local instead of the express train. What would have normally been a three hour trip was quickly stretching out into six hours. Natsuki flipped through another page of data as she worked her way though yet another round of emissions calculations. Shizuru was asleep against her shoulder and Nao was playing some game on her cell phone on the seat across from them, making odd noises whenever she had to do something unexpected in the game. Across the aisle, Tate and Yukino were talking quietly about politics, and Haruka was dozing against the window.

She frowned slight, why Haruka had to come was completely beyond her. It would have been all well and good if Haruka was a HiME, but as of now, she was just a powerless civilian that would slow them down.

At the same time, it was a comfort to have the loud woman with them. Natsuki hated to admit that she found Haruka's outbursts soothing at times, not to mention the fact that Haruka was an impartial observer to the whole situation. If anything, she might be able to make some sense of the level of riddles that Mai's e-mails seemed to elude the rest of them.

Tate had been quiet throughout the build-up to leaving, standing silently off to one side, holding his young daughter as though she were the only thing keeping him attached to this world. Natsuki understood that feeling, for leaving Jun behind had been very hard on her, but Tate had a lot more to lose this time. He'd been there with Mai, after all, for that final battle after Natsuki and everyone else had vanished into nothingness. _He'd_ been the one who'd given Mai her opportunity to attack so that the rest of the world could be saved.

Love like that knew no bounds, really, and Natsuki was happy for them.

He'd brought something wrapped in cloth with him, a shinai if Natsuki guessed correctly, and Natsuki prayed that he wouldn't have to use it. They simply had to go to Fuuka and speak to Mai – she'd know what to do, she had to.

Natsuki was sick of acting as the leader. She had her own problems to deal with, and Mai had been the force that had unified them so well in the past. She'd hoped that the HiME could all beat the fight together, but as it seemed, the final battle would still be a HiME on HiME free-for-all. She hated that idea, hated the very notion that people might have to die again.

Tate was in more danger than he knew, if Natsuki's conjectures about what awaited them when they got to Fuuka were right.

Natsuki was worried, very worried, that somehow they were missing something in their evaluation of the situation, but she couldn't put her finger on what.

All they had to do was go to Fuuka and get Mai.

There was no real need for confrontation, save the fact that this could not continue. They needed closure, and they needed this to end.

She closed her portfolio with a click and nestled her head against Shizuru's. This was going to be a long trip, and sleep was something that none of them had been getting enough of recently. She closed her eyes and curled her fingers around Shizuru's, they could be at peace, here in this moment, just for a short while.

That was more than Natsuki had ever wanted.


	29. Chapter 29

**Passages Chapter Twenty Nine**

AN: The problem with this story: AH OMG THERE IS STILL ANOTHER PLOT ARC THAT I WANT TO DO. D8

Solution: OMG SEQUEL?!

I found it very strange to write Midori in this part of the story, because I see her largely as an over enthusiastic researcher. She's a support character but her research is so vital to the storyline that I keep her around, even though I hadn't planned on her to actually go to Fuuka at all. However she is a good fighter and she'll force the situation far better than Nao or Mai would, so she's on for the ride.

Also: Let's try for 200 reviews! We're six away people!

I've never gotten over 150 reviews ago, so this story is a real journey into the power of feedback and how awesome it is. :D

* * *

_Fuuka is the same that it always is, a quiet city with a lovely shore line that haunts my memories. I hate it here and yet I feel at truly at peace in this god-forsaken land. I wonder if this is because I simply lack the social skills to feel happy in any other place. This is where I first killed, where I first became an adult. _

_This is where I died._

_This is where I truly lived._

_-_

_Ten Minutes Later._

Kuga Natsuki lifted her travel bag – a small green duffle - a little further up her shoulder and stared at the red-haired woman waiting for them on the platform just as they pulled into the train station. Sugiura Midori stood there with her arms folded across her chest. She was dressed conservatively in a jacket and khaki pants that made her look every bit the thirty-seven or so years (one never could tell with Midori) that she'd been alive. This was not the childishly perpetual student who still insisted that she was seventeen years old occasionally. Natsuki thought that the outfit was a good improvement on Midori's usual trying to dress hip, but something else was bothering her. They hadn't heard from Midori since they'd left the bowling alley the night before, and no one knew where she'd gotten to. When she hadn't shown up for the train, Natsuki hadn't been all that worried, guessing that something like this would happen.

Midori, if not anything else, was predictable in her unpredictability.

Still, it was annoying to suddenly find herself face to face with Midori when she wasn't expecting it. The woman required at least ten minutes of mental preparation before every physical encounter. The phone wasn't so bad, as long as one was able to deal with Midori's seeming inability to pay attention on the phone. "What are you doing here?" she demanded of her former history teacher. Natsuki knew that she should have known better when Midori disappeared without a word after their meeting at the bowling alley. The overzealous woman would make a b-line for Fuuka and completely forget herself as she lost herself once more in her passion, the land of the HiME and the legends that surrounded all of their destinies

Midori laughed quietly and moved forward to sling a casual arm over Natsuki's shoulder. Natsuki tried her best not to wince away from the contact and simply glared at the older woman, whose wide grin was somewhat infectious. Natsuki did not think this was a time for smiling. "I went ahead last night and spoke to the head of the school about what we're about to do, Natsuki," she explained, her expression turning sad once more. "I realized something. If the most important person in question is indeed Yuuichi again then we have a problem."

"I know," Natsuki shook her head. She and Shizuru had discussed this before, the concept that they might, in their desperate search for the root cause for all of these problems, somehow get someone hurt. Mai had been the most likely candidate in their theories then and now, and Natsuki was terrified of what might happen should Yuuichi Tate vanish into nothingness. She'd seen Mai going berserk before and she never wanted to repeat the experience.

It had taken Shizuru to put her down then, and Shizuru was sure to not use nearly as much force this time. She cared for Mai far too much to use the direct hit and put-down style of attack that she'd been so famous for fifteen years ago.

She tightened her resolve and nodded grimly to the rest of the people gathering around them. They had a plan and they would stick to it. Fuuka seemed a welcoming city, but they all knew better.

"Come on," Midori said, "I booked some hotel rooms."

Natsuki had not thought to do that, and she smiled thankfully at the taller woman before extracting herself from Midori's grip and made her way over to Shizuru. The HiME and their tag-alongs followed Midori as a group, but Natsuki hung back just far enough so that she and Shizuru could have a private word.

"I'm going to call Yamada," she muttered. The conversation was half for herself, half for Shizuru. Natsuki had to push herself to actually call the man, because she felt no cause to ever want to speak to him again now that their past business was long done and over. He still owed her a few favors, and Natsuki needed to collect on one of them now.

Shizuru looked at her sharply, her eyes flashing under the dim lights of the road that Midori was leading them down. "Are you sure that that's wise?" she asked in a hushed voice.

To tell the truth, Natsuki honestly did not know. She did not want First District, had they not already caught wind of this new development in the current situation, to hear about it though their connections to Yamada. Still, the information that they needed was the sort that they were not going to get unless they were very lucky with the people that Natsuki knew in the area and whatever the school could provide them with. Yamada actually knew what he was talking about, most of the time. "I think that the chances we've gone unnoticed is fairly slim, so it's not like he'd be learning information that he didn't already know."

"Still, Natsuki, I don't believe that this has anything to do with First District, involving them, no matter how inadvertently though Mister Yamada just seems like a very large risk for what we're here to do." Shizuru reached down and laced her fingers though those of Natsuki's free hand. "We're just here to get Mai and go home, remember? That's what we told Jun we were going to do, and that's what we're doing." Her words left no room for argument and Natsuki sighed for there was no fighting with Shizuru when she got like this.

She would still call Yamada, but she would do it on her own time, when Shizuru was far away from her. She hadn't visited her mother in a long time, and she felt as though that seaside cliff would provide her with a minute of peace in this hectic whirlwind of events. She'd have to find someone to borrow a bike from, however, because she was _not_ going to get stuck in a car any more than she could help it.

-

Further ahead in the group, Yuuki Nao cast curious looks in the direction of the tail end of their group, where Kuga and Fujino were talking quietly together. She envied the couple for being able to actually relate to each other in some sort of a meaningful way that didn't involve antagonism and feeling awful about what she was doing all the time. Nao desperately craved that feeling of being loved. She couldn't find that love, for no matter where she looked the door seemed to be closed to her.

She had sex, sex with many people of different shapes and sizes, but nothing brought her the feeling that being surrounded by the rest of the HiME at the unofficial 'HiME Rangers' meetings. They were her friends and companions, and they made her feel as though she had a family even after she'd accepted the fact that her mother didn't want anything to do with her. All around her were loving relationships, however dysfunctional, and Nao wanted in on that action.

She just lacked the social skills to attract a made of her own, it seemed.

_Maybe I'm just defunct_, Nao mused, shoving her hands into her pockets and scowling at Mikoto, who'd fallen into step beside her, the large black case she carried Miroku in casting a dark shadow over the pair of them.

Mikoto pulled on Nao's sleeve, her expression slightly pathetic as she looked up at Nao. She was still so short, compared to everyone else. Nao'd shot up a few inches while still in high school, but Mikoto had remained the same size she'd been in middle school. Small, compact and a perfect killing machine, even now. "What happens when Mai has to choose between Yuuichi staying alive and killing Shiho's child?"

Nao hadn't even thought of that. They were screwed, really. There was no way that they could take care of this problem without somehow putting Mai's happiness in danger. She was just starting to have the life that she deserved and even Nao couldn't find it in herself to be spiteful over the fact that Mai was finally getting the happiness that she'd worked for so hard in high school.

She tried to pull something of a reassuring look on to her face and more or less succeeded, as the grimace that resulted felt comforting, if a little foolish. "I'm sure that we'll figure out a way to make this work, Mikoto. That's just the way that these things work out, we don't know until we know. And then we act on upon the information, no questions asked." It was a conditioned response of a soldier, not a young woman who worked in the advertising industry. Nao hated it, for it made her feel even more inhuman that her lack of love did.

Mikoto looked troubled, and Nao could think of nothing to add to her statement to make the girl feel better. Theirs was a harsh situation and there wasn't really anything that could be said to make it seem any better. Mikoto seemed to make up her mind, her eyes flicking from Nao and back over the rest of the group before her hands clenched resolutely on the black strap that kept Miroku firmly attached to her back. "I won't let Mai's happiness come into question," she said with a firm nod, "she is too important to be for that."

Nao reached down and ruffled Mikoto's hair. "That's good," she said with a grin. Someone had to look out for Mai in all of this chaos, that was all that there was to it, because Kuga and Fujino were concerned only for each other, and Nao herself was connected to them whether or not she wanted to be. She just wished that there was some way that they wouldn't even have to worry about Mai in the first place. The fact that Yuuichi could die from actions like the ones that they might be forced to take was not lost on her.

She just didn't want to have that blood on her hands. Nao had not slaughtered hundreds during the carnival, but her hands were far from clean. She had to remember that while her crimes were never quite as drastic as Fujino or Kuga's, they still existed and needed no further reminders to keep them prevalent in Nao's mind. She hated the idea that she was powerless to prevent further blood from staining her hands.

Nao prayed that Kuga had a plan to get them out of this situation, because she honestly didn't have a clue what they would do if they were attacked. They all knew that they couldn't fight back, and while people like Midori and Akira were always gunning for a fight, there was so much on the line right now that Nao was positive that even they would fall silent.

Mai's happiness was in danger. She was the one who'd grated them this second chance. They had to be there for her.

-

"Why are they with us?" Natsuki demanded of Shizuru with her arms crossed and a scowl on her face.

From across the room, Kikukawa Yukino adjusted her glasses and smiled sheepishly at Natsuki and Shizuru while putting a calming hand on Suzushiro Haruka's shoulder. "We've come along to make sure that Mai is safe and I need to have a word with the principal."

Natsuki nodded, _Right, her political connections_. Himeno Fumi was definitely the sort that would be very well-connected within the government, considering how many times the authorities had simply looked the other way when it came to the more bizarre happenings in and around the school. Natsuki just wished that she had gotten a head's up before she found herself trapped in an enclosed space with Suzushiro Haruka. They'd ordered a taxi to pick them up and take them to the hotel and already Natsuki was starting to get fidgety about being in a car.

Her fear of them was perfectly rational, and they would be driving along the very roads where her childhood had been forever ruined by First District. She allowed her hand to drop down to Shizuru's and the taller woman squeezed it reassuringly. Natsuki was brave, she could do this. She'd done cars before, but never in Fuuka, never so close to that dreaded stretch of road that even today haunted Natsuki's dreams.

"I see." Natsuki said, looking at her feet and wishing that the taxi would just arrive so that they could get this trip done and over with. She didn't want to admit her fear to Yukino or Suzushiro, and she wasn't going to let her perfect poker face - a scowl and an annoyed disposition - fall for anything. She had too much at stake in this particular meeting.

She had to make sure that Mai was alright before they tried to do anything.

A white-colored four-door sedan with the checkered stripes that marked it as a public taxi pulled up and the driver honked the horn once. Their ride was here. Natsuki's grip on Shizuru's hand tightened and Natsuki pretended that she didn't hear the sharp inhalation of breath from behind her. She was hurting Shizuru and she knew it.

"Come on," she grunted. She took a hesitant step forward, and then another, this time more confident. She could do this. She was sure of it. They stuffed themselves into the back of the cab as only one can do when there are four people and only three seatbelts, with Yukino perched primly on Suzushiro's lap, her cheeks a rosy red as the blond wrapped her arms around the smaller woman and promised loudly that no harm would befall her.

Only she said 'beget' instead of 'befall' and Natsuki felt a smile crack across her face.

"It's going to be alright," Shizuru muttered into Natsuki's ear as she was fumbling with the clip for her seatbelt.

Natsuki grunted her agreement, but didn't let go of Shizuru's hand as the cab sped up the long sloping hill along the shoreline that lead to the school.

The cabbie asked them if they were visiting the area for any reason in particular, but no one had the heart to tell him anything, so he fell silent and instead turned up the sports broadcast that he'd been listening to on his radio. Natsuki felt a frown pull her mouth downwards, her team was losing. Again.

At the gates to the school, the cab rolled to a stop and Natsuki practically threw the required fare at him, not bothering to collect the change as she scrambled out of the car.

"What was that about?" Suzushiro demanded as the rest of them go out.

Natsuki watched as Shizuru shook her head and Yukino looked away sadly. Obviously, the loud woman had not picked up on the unspoken tension in Natsuki's every movement since they'd first mentioned getting a cab to take them up to Fuuka.

"Kuga..." Yukino explained in a hushed voice, "doesn't do well with cars."

Natsuki turned and walked away, onto the school grounds once more. It felt so strange to be back in such a place, after she'd left thirteen years ago, she'd vowed never to return and she'd kept that promise to herself. Shizuru had taken her to Kyoto and they'd gone to college there, far away from the pain and memories of this place.

The trees that lined the central walkway onto the school campus were devoid of trees, their empty branches reaching up like fingers clawing towards the sky. Natsuki shivered, there had always been something very ominous about this place in the winter - she'd never noticed it while she'd still been at school. It was like the school was just waiting for something to happen to shatter the fragile peace that seemed the permeate the place.

"Eerie, isn't it?" Shizuru commented, falling into step beside Natsuki, her wrist flicking every so often and a yellow crackle of barely-suppressed power sparking against the dull light of the overcast sky.

"Like something out of a nightmare," Natsuki agreed. She stuck her hands into her pockets and together they walked quickly past the groups of students gathered in small clumps all over the main walkway. School had just started and it would be a few more minutes until homeroom started. Natsuki guessed that these kids were just trying to catch up before the inevitable pull of school once again drew them back indoors.

They hung a right at the main school building and headed towards the administrative offices, now located in a building off to the side of the actual school complex. While Kazehana Mashiro - or whatever that girl had been - was running the school, the principal had been kept far away from the eyes of the school. Himeno Fumi did things differently, wanting her students to actually know who she was and interact with her.

Natsuki thought that Fumi's model was better - for there was never any doubt in her mind that Kazehana had been doing something wrong during her time as principal.

_She'd been too involved with the carnival – didn't much care for the rest of the students._

"Natsuki!" Natsuki perked up to a voice that she hadn't heard in weeks.

Mai ran towards her with a bright smile on her face and the trademark orange blazer of Fuuka covering her upper torso. Natsuki wondered what she was doing wearing a school uniform, but she realized that the chances that anyone had clothes that fit Mai's bust size would be limited and she'd be better off wearing the school jackets than anything else.

Natsuki met her halfway with a bright smile. Mai pulled her into a hug and the two women stood there for a minute, just taking in the fact that they were once again together, a united front against this evil.

Pulling away, Natsuki frowned at Mai. "Never do that again," she growled. "Do you have any idea how out of my mind I was with worry about you?"

Mai rubbed the back of her neck and looked sheepishly from Natsuki to Shizuru and back again. "Sorry..."

"Come here, you," Natsuki said, pulling her into a hug once more.

Mai was more important to them than anyone wanted to admit. She was the very lifeblood of their little band - and no one would dare forget it.


	30. Chapter 30

**Passages Chapter Thirty**

AN: Thank you everyone for the nice reviews, but for the people who commented that this story seems 'dead,' I have to say something to you honestly. I had exams. College Exams.

Also: The thing at the end, is direct translation from Japanese. Sounds better in Japanese as well.

So yeah. Update for you all. This chapter was really hard to write and I don't know why. I think that I have some sort of unfettered issues with Mai that I just haven't worked out yet, but she's a fun character to write.

**Lone Wolf **- So ... what are your speculations about the whole Mai-in-the-Fuku thing? Because I was merely doing it for practicality's sake. As in, there was a bit of a timeskip from when Mai wakes up at Fuuka in chapter... eighteen or so and when Natsuki actually gets the text from her in Chapter 26. It was just that Mai probably obliterated all her clothes with Kagutsuchi again. What did you think I was doing? :3

* * *

_Seeing Mai again was like a dream. Power seems to radiate off of her like a cloak and I suddenly found myself remembering whyI had always been a little bit afraid of her back during the carnival. We'd agreed not to fight each other, but I still worried sometimes after what I had seen happen when Takumi died. _

_It wasn't that Mai's power as a HiME was that impressive, and it never had been. Mikoto or Shizuru could have easily taken her in a fight; but it was rather the way that she carried herself – as though all parties involved were somehow directly influenced by the outcome of her actions. _

_Odd, really, because it was true. Mai had the ability to turn a battle by her mere presence. _

_I hope that this fight will let us see that skill again. We could use it._

_That was all in the past now, and Mai is still the same that she's always been. She looks as though she's moved through the world with the ease of its conqueror. I wondered what had happened to her, but she was far too tight-lipped about the whole thing for my liking. I figured that she would tell me when she was ready. I wasn't one to pry._

_She told us that she'd managed to char off her clothing in the progress of summoning Kagutsuchi to rescue herself from the dark universe where she'd found herself after awakening. I don't know what exactly happened to pull her into that world in the first place, but the place that she described could very easily be the darkness within anyone's heart._

_I think I know where we've got to head next._

_-_

_Three Hours earlier._

"Mai, why are you wearing a Fuuka uniform?" Natsuki asked, her brow furrowed in confusion as she pulled tentatively on the collar of the jacket. Mai had released her from the hug and was smiling kindly over at Shizuru, who had her hand over her mouth, just barely hiding a fond smile. Natsuki felt annoyance rise up in her – as Shizuru would most likely tease her about his to no end later on – and she coughed quietly, pulling Mai's attention back to her. "You can't have burned it all off again."

Mai puffed out her cheeks and looked indignant, and Natsuki knew that she had done exactly that. She tried to push down a smile as Mai answered her, but a grin still managed to creep across the previously serious set of her mouth. "It wasn't my fault this time. I just landed in the middle of a flower bed."

Natsuki folded her arms across her chest and grinned. "Again, you did that last time too. Anyway, Mai, we've got Tate waiting back at the hotel - he wanted to come but there wasn't enough room in the cab."

Cabs were something that Mai understood about Natsuki, something that they could both agree were by far the worst modes of transportation available. Yuuichi would understand, on some level, but Natsuki knew just how much Mai wanted to see her husband.

Friends were one thing, but family was something different. Family was the ties that bound Mai to this world, where as friends were just an added bonus.

"Oh." Mai looked slightly upset by Natsuki's comment, and Natsuki found herself reaching down to grasp her friend's hands. She didn't have the words to tell Mai exactly what had transpired to prevent Mai's husband from coming with them in the first place. There wasn't even a good reason. Just a feeling that both Natsuki and Shizuru had shared. Something that told them that it would be better for everyone if Yuuichi Tate did not have to witness his wife's reunion with her fellow HiME.

There were too many questions that Natsuki needed answered before she allowed the tearful reunion between husband and long-lost wife too place.

Mai squeezed Natsuki's hands, her eyes clearly showing that she was hurt by the decision. "I would have thought that he'd come anyway."

Natsuki wished that she had handled this better.

"I insisted upon it." Shizuru's voice cut though their conversation and they both turned to look at her, Natsuki silently wondering what Shizuru was doing, taking the blame of what had clearly been Natsuki's decision, and her's alone.

"Fujino?" Mai asked with a raised eyebrow.

Natsuki looked from her lover to her best friend with curious eyes, wondering what Shizuru would say to Mai to get her back down.

Shizuru stood back, her arms clasped in front to her as she started to talk. She looked almost apologetic, but Natsuki knew that Shizuru would never apologize for something that was common sense. She must have some other reason for doing this. "While Natsuki thought it quite rude of me to say something like that to your husband, Mai, I had to be sure that we were not going to get waylaid by some evil force and have to worry about protecting him on top of fighting." Shizuru raised a hand and tapped it thoughtfully on her chin. She smiled at Mai sadly, "Call it a selfish reason, if you would. I didn't want his death on my hands, should it come to that."

"Shizuru!" Natsuki did not want to think about that as a possibility of anyone dying. Shizuru usually had a better set of her wits about her when it came to that sort of thing. No one should be dying in this conflict, Natsuki was sure of that. They knew who the villain was, but like the situation that Natsuki found herself at the incontinent middle of, there was no way that this could end without tears.

She did not want to have to cope with the fact that if Yuuichi Tate simply was out of the picture, this entire conflict would go away. Tate had always been nice to her and accepting of her relationship with Shizuru as though it were the most natural thing in the world. She could not let Shizuru's words, spoken in hopes of placating Mai, be for naught.

Mai was the normal one, the girl who'd accidentally gotten pregnant and had had to marry quickly to cover it up - the girl who'd asked Shizuru and herself to function as witnesses for the important occasion.

Mai was the one who'd saved them all those years ago. Natsuki knew that she owed Mai a lot more than she was willing to admit. Mai was just the positive force of good in their lives these days. One could not simply let such a relationship slide away into nothingness because one feared the worst that could happen constantly.

Maybe that just came with being HiME. They were doomed; it seemed, to be forever stuck in the rut of unhappiness.

Shizuru rested a calming hand on Mai's shoulder. "I'm sorry; it's the truth, however."

Natsuki scowled at her. She wasn't really helping the situation with her false cheer and general attitude. Natsuki thought that a more proactive approach would be better, anyway. "You didn't have to say it like that, seriously." Natsuki knew that she was grumbling, and that Shizuru would tease her about it later, but that was enough of the conversation. They'd end up talking about the elephant in the room if they weren't careful - and the grounds of this awful place where they'd all died certainly was not the best location for that particular heart to heart. Natsuki ran a hand though her hair and turned her attention back to Mai. "Mai, did the principal want to see us?" she asked.

"Yes, actually." Mai cast one last fleeting look at the school gates, just barely visible in the late autumn sunlight. She sighed and shrugged. "She mentioned that Yukino and Suzushiro were going to be here too."

"They're slow," Natsuki folded her arms across her chest. "They came up with us, however."

"You walk fast, Natsuki." Mai pointed out.

"Whatever," Natsuki huffed. She pulled her jacket a little more tightly around her, shivering in the chill. Winter was setting in fast, and she didn't want to be doing any more fighting in this cooler weather than she had to. Summer was the time for battles; the winter was for taking care of children and making sure that they got through the school year in one piece. Jun was getting better, but Natsuki still worried about the residual effects of him living without anyone caring for him for so long. It just wasn't fair, really. "We should go in. Himeno's probably waiting for us, and I don't want to keep her if I can't help it."

They couldn't stay here; they had lives, far away from this awful place.

"Yes, let's get you inside." Mai agreed, turning and leading the way back into the administrative building. She pushed the door open and the hot air of the heater located above the door blasted the three of them with a breath of hot, dry air.

Natsuki coughed, her eyes squinting under the sudden heat. Fumi Himeno's door stood open and waiting for them.

The woman who'd taken over Fuuka was positively blossoming under the role. She had made changes to the way the school was run and the students had become known as some of the best in the country in terms of both academics and athletics. It was not uncommon, as far as Natsuki was aware, for there to be scouts from various athletic teams at Fuuka's school sporting events.

Haruka and Yukino trailed in a few moments behind Natsuki, looking annoyed and slightly confused at the fact that they'd been left to collect the change from the cab and deal with the driver. He was going to have to wait, or they were going to walk down. Natsuki hoped he'd left, because she was more than willing to take the short cut through the Fuuka grounds back down into the city.

"I see that you are all here, then," Fumi Himeno's quiet voice filtered from within the doors to her office. Natsuki felt almost as though she should snap to attention and salute, but she checked the reflex. Himeno needed them, and not the other way around, for once. "Come in."

They trooped into her office, and she stood, bowing politely and deeply. Natsuki felt a little awkward, returning the bow at about half the depth that the principal had. She was an adult, and not some sort of hired maid. She would not bow that deeply to anyone, thank you.

"Sit," Himeno said. She moved to the tea service on her desk and began to prepare cups to tea for everyone. Natsuki felt her brow begin to twitch as she watched the tea be dispersed and the conversation to lull. She wanted answers and she didn't want to have to wait for tea to get them.

Natsuki cleared her throat, coughing politely into her fist as best she could. She'd learned the gesture from Shizuru years ago, and so far it had worked for diffusing situations that she didn't like. She just wasn't sure how it would work in such a situation. "We're here because you know things, Principal. Things that we cannot hope to know while still maintaining autonomy from whatever drives this school and the carnival."

"I know, Kuga Natsuki. Take your tea and sit with the rest of us." The principal sat down in her desk chair and pulled out a worn book from a desk drawer and set it down on the clear workspace.

Natsuki found herself leaning forward with an interested look on her face before she could catch the reflex. She'd seen this book before, many times, in the hands of that obnoxious little boy who'd somehow managed to ruin all of their lives. Why did Himeno have Nagi's book?

"The child that has chosen to bond itself to Munakata Shiho is a dark one. There was a reason why it never played a major role in the carnival until it was almost too late to stop it. It is the hidden evil within all of our souls. Yatagarasu, while a deity of some notoriety in the modern setting, once represented something far more sinister than a three-legged bird that protects the sun." Himeno's voice was cold and distant. Natsuki thought that she sounded as though she'd rehearsed the lines that she was speaking now. "If you kill it, however, there is a good chance that nothing will happen to any of the parties in the question."

"Why is that?" Shizuru asked quietly. Natsuki glanced at her and found her expression unreadable. She never liked it when Shizuru got like that, for it meant that there would be a long, uphill battle until they got to the point where Shizuru allowed her emotions to play plainly across her face. "When a child dies, the most important person to the HiME dies with them. That is the rule."

_She would know, _Natsuki knew that those words were left unspoken in the room, but that the entire room was thinking it. She hated when people asked her if she was alright, if things were working out between herself and Shizuru. She hated the idea that she was somehow defunct because she'd died for something that could have been called love fifteen years ago.

She was a person and she'd made her decisions, just like the rest of them had.

Being someone's most important person didn't mean that you love them, necessarily. But it certainly did help.

Yukino pushed her glasses up her nose and sighed quietly. "I think I can answer that. Fujino, the reason that this time it's different is because this _isn't_ the carnival. Nothing is on the line here; the Obsidian Lord has been oddly silent. This is probably a carry-over from the anger that Ms. Munakata felt at Mai's marriage and the birth of her child."

The room feel silent once more, and Natsuki found her own voice cutting through the silence, "Why now? Why are there orphans running around once more?"

"It was like this in the past." Mai said quietly. "When I fought Shiho in the past, there were orphans that followed that child around as though it were their mother. If anything, it's raising them itself to help and combat his mistress' anger."

-

"Are you sure that you want to go alone, Natsuki?" Shizuru asked as Natsuki stood at the head of the footpath that lead down through the hillside and towards the shore road once more. "I could go with you."

Natsuki shook her head. Going to visit this place was something that she had to do herself. She'd told the others that she needed to think for a few minutes before they all gathered and prepared to go and confront Shiho about what was going on. Part of her doubted that Shiho even knew what she was doing, but Natsuki was not willing to take that chance without first trying something.

She couldn't have Shizuru there.

And yet she wanted her to be there.

_What if he doesn't come?_

_He didn't come before. All those times when I called him and he didn't come back to me and remind me why I was doing this. Why I put myself through this hell for the two of us. _

_He was my best friend just like Shizuru was. _

_And then he vanished._

Natsuki pushed the traitorous thoughts aside and stepped forward. Her feet crunched on the half-frozen earth beneath her boots and she exhaled quietly. Shizuru understood, she had to. This was a personal errand, and one that Natsuki knew that she would have to do alone from the very beginning. "I've got to do this alone, Shizuru."

The honey-haired woman nodded. There was a sadness in her eyes that Natsuki did not like. Something that warned her to be careful what she said next. Shizuru's lips moved silently for a few seconds, before the words finally came out. "Be careful?" she asked, her tone suggesting that Natsuki should try as hard possibly could to prevent anything bad from happening to her.

Natsuki grabbed Shizuru's hand and smiled, "Always." She brought Shizuru's gloved hand up to her lips and kissed the back of her palm, before pulling the taller woman into a hug. "Don't worry," she continued, "I'll be fine."

Shizuru's lips brushed against Natsuki's cheek and Natsuki turned her head just to catch the corner of her lover's mouth. She laughed and tried again. Their lips met gently, it was strange to kiss Shizuru in a place like this, as Natsuki associated so many bad memories with this school. Still, the kiss was calming and reassuring. Natsuki knew that this was the right thing when Shizuru pulled away and smiled.

"I'm off then." Natsuki said, starting down the foot path.

"Go and come back safely." Shizuru responded quietly.


	31. Chapter 31

**Passages Chapter Thirty One  
**

AN: This one came quickly, I think because it's a scene that I've been wanting to write since the beginning of the story. A lot of reviews expected it to go the wrong way, but Duran accepted Natsuki's denial of her feelings for Shizuru a lot longer than her guns refused her in the beginning of this story. So yeah. This bit, goes easier than the usual angst trap of this story. Tell me what you think, for I always love reviews. :D

Wow. 210 Reviews. We're really doing good for ourselves this time, aren't we?

* * *

Passages 31

_I did not know what to expect, coming into this place. My mother had died here, I'd nearly died here more than once. It was like the place that I should have avoided at all costs for fear of somehow fucking this whole thing up. I couldn't die here, and I had no intension of doing anything of the sort. I knew that Shizuru would watch me, ready to ride in on her giant purple steed, should the need arise. _

_Still, it was strange, standing here with nothing but myself, on this cliff face. I am a grown woman now, I should have no need to seem terrified of such a place, and yet the fear is within me, deeply seeded._

_I lost my mother, and my best friend to this place._

_I nearly lost Nao over the cliff face as well. _

_Shizuru was never the same after she revealed herself to be a HiME. She took care of me, held me in my sleep, and whispered sweet nothings in my ear until I fell calm once more. Yet she was never the same. I have nightmares of those eyes, those haunted eyes peering at me though the darkness._

_She promised things to me, that night, things that she has never repeated. I think that it's for fear of someone finding out and fucking it up like Suzushiro's big mouth did during the carnival. They were beautiful words, carefully laid down in such a way that I thought that I would drown in them then._

_I cannot think of what I would do with them now. _

_Cry probably. _

_And then die of humiliation every time Shizuru brings them up._

_I do not like writing here. My hand is cramped and it feels as though I'm pouring my soul out to pages of paper that do not really understand what I'm going through. _

_Who am I writing for? _

_Me? That's a rich thing, because I think it was my journal that got us into this mess in the first place. It's been missing since before the attacks started, and I'm almost positive that once we deal with Munakata Shiho, we will find it with her things. I don't write for me._

_Shizuru? I'm better at telling her things verbally. Or rather, I'm good at getting annoyed at her for winding me around in circles as she plays word games with me. But our relationship isn't me pouring my feelings out to a book because I can't express myself._

_I write for my mother. I think. _

_I write because she never had a chance to watch me grow up, she never got to meet Jun or Shizuru. She just left me as a young child with only Duran to keep me company. _

_I think that's why I want to tell her everything about myself. She never got a chance to know me as a person. Just me as a small child._

_I'm so different now._

_-_

Two minutes later.

Kuga Natsuki swallowed deeply and shoved the small notebook deep into her jacket pocket. The sound of waves was hypnotic and she leaned over the steel barrier that had been erected on the side of the cliff face after the end of the carnival to peer at the waves lapping against the rocks, some twenty-five meters below. The sense of vertigo was nearly overpowering and Natsuki pushed herself backwards and took a step away from the edge. She wasn't ready for _that_ just yet, it seemed.

No one was around, the seaside road was deserted during the winter months for the most part because of the dangers of ice and the steep drop off of the side of the road to the ocean below. There were other ways of getting from the school down to the city, and this was really a back road, the route that Natsuki had taken to school for many years because it kept her out of the public light. She hated it when people could see her arriving late to school then, and she supposed, on some level that she hated it now too.

Only now she never had to worry about someone saying something, as she was the boss and could get their ass fired if she felt so inclined.

It was strange to be here, for she'd avoided this place since leaving Fuuka for a better life outside of this trap-like island of bad memories. Natsuki sighed.

"I know that you don't want to come," she said quietly. She was speaking to the wind, the icy howling breeze that was coming in off of the choppy bay below her. She was speaking to the wind and the ice, her own element. "I know that you think that I'm too conflicted to put one life and once life alone on the line for this battle."

The wind quieted, a lull that suggested that it was listening. Natsuki knew better than to believe that, but she liked the idea that she somehow did control the elements that much. She was not _that_ kind of magical girl, despite all of Midori's wishes and the regular meetings of the HiME-Sentai. She just happened to use ice in her guns in the place of real bullets.

She thought that that was a better idea, ice was untraceable, anyway.

"I love Jun, I love Shizuru, I love my mother." Natsuki sighed, wrapping her arms around herself and scowling at the growing dusk, "How can you expect me to chose one person to die should I mess up? I don't want any of them to die."

The wind howled again, roaring at her defiance, or maybe at the fact that the clouds looked suspiciously like snow. Natsuki frowned; it was too early for snow.

She closed her fist in the air, concentrating as she pulled the protons together to summon her guns. It was a reassuring feeling when they fell into her hands with no resistance. The element was not tied to the child, Nagi had said long ago, when Duran would not come before. Natsuki could fight, but she could not hope to win.

Natsuki held the guns up, examining them carefully. "Duran, if I call you, would you come?"

She was a grown woman. She had no time for childish fears like this. Duran would come because she was an adult. Kuga Natsuki had responsibilities to too many people for him not to come when called.

Her guns complied as she brought the level and fired two shots off of the edge of the cliff. "Duran!" she shouted, hoping, _praying_ that he would come.

The wind howled around her, pulling Natsuki's hair out from under her jacket and blowing it into her face. She raised her hand to brush it out of her eyes as another creature's howl joined the fray.

The wolf stood before her, proud and tall.

Natsuki ran towards him, her arms around his snout as she laughed. "I knew you would come," she felt like a child again, a girl who'd been reunited with her best friend in the whole world.

She stepped back and looked down at Duran. "Why are you so small?" she wondered out loud. She'd never known Duran to answer.

The wind roared and Natsuki watched with wide eyes as Duran began to grow, to expand to the size that he had been on that fateful day fifteen years ago. Natsuki walked up to him. "Is my heart really big enough to contain this much love?"

She wasn't sure that she wanted to know.

It would completely ruin her reputation.

-

Stepping out of the cab, no one knew what to expect from the reunion of husband and wife, especially not the wife herself. Mai was not all that happy with her husband for deciding to heed the advice of _Fujino, _of all people, when it came to matters of the heart. Fujino was by far the last person to take advice from, because her words were almost always hypocritical, as she went against them whenever Natsuki was giving her the cold shoulder.

Mai stood in the hotel's small lobby and tried to put her thoughts together. She didn't know what she wanted from Yuuichi, if it was a hug or a kiss or passionate sex right there on the lobby floor. She doubted that he'd be up for that last one, but the idea did have some promise and she'd have to get him in the mood later.

She'd missed him so much.

"Mai!" He was across the room now, his hair sticking up at odd angles and looking as though he hadn't slept in weeks.

Mai took a step forward, and then another. She was in his arms in a second, tears running down her face.

"You idiot, why did you listen to them and not come to get me?" she demanded, her hands balled into fists, clinging to bits of his shirt.

Yuuichi rested his hands on her shoulders and pushed her back slightly, so that she was forced to look up at him. "I didn't come because Fujino had a very good point."

Mai pouted, before moving in to hug him once more. "That doesn't mean that you couldn't have come anyway. I would protect you, and I'm sure that Natsuki would as well."

He smiled, "You worry too much. I had to make sure that Mikoto didn't run off and try to fix everyone's problems by herself while Natsuki and the others went for you." He sighed quietly, "I missed you."

"Me too," Mai agreed.

They stood like that for a few minutes, content to simply have their arms around each other. Mai didn't think about how backwards it was, with him in his work clothes from last night and her wearing a Fuuka blazer because she'd managed to ruin her shirt completely when she'd arrived on the school grounds earlier that week. They were adults once again, but suddenly she felt like a student, clinging to her first boy friend as if he were the only anchor to this plane of reality.

"As much as I love a happy ending," the quiet voice of Kanzaki Reito cut through their reverie. He was standing right behind them, his hands in his pockets and his hair wet as though he'd just come from the baths. Mai wondered when he'd gotten so good at sneaking up behind people, because she would not have pegged it for his style before now.

It struck her as odd that he was even _here_ in the first place. Natsuki had been less-than-forthcoming with the information when Mai had asked, and talking to Fujino or Yukino had just seemed as though she was grasping at straws when she didn't really have a full picture of the situation. Mai liked knowing what was going on, and Reito's presence bothered her.

Reito seemed not to notice her confusion, however, as his attention was so clearly on other matters. "We have bigger issues to deal with. Kuga's back and she's brought some bad news with her."

Mai turned to see a rather red-cheeked Natsuki coming through the door with an angry look in her eyes. Blood trailed down her cheek from a cut just below her hairline and her coat looked slightly singed.

"What happened?" Mai demanded as Natsuki shook her head at Reito's offer for assistance in making it to one of the few benches that the lobby had set up for patrons to sit on while they waited for the front desk staff to be free. She sat herself down and pulled at the collar of her sweater and scarf, separating them and unwinding the scarf from her neck. Splotches of red cut across the white fabric and Mai frowned.

They'd be awful to get out.

"Orphans. They followed us back here." Natsuki sighed, smiling slightly. "I took 'em down, however. They were rather weak compared to the ones that we encountered back home." She reached into her pocket and pulled up a small make up compact and flipped it open. Frowning, she began to poke at the wound on her forehead.

Mai slapped her hand away. "Let me see." The cut wasn't deep, just nasty looking, really. Head wounds always bled a lot. She sucked her teeth as sue used some of the medical gauze that Natsuki had crammed into the compact to dab at the blood. "You're lucky you don't need stitches, what happened?"

She hoped that Natsuki would be more honest with her. Fujino and the others were off looking for a place where they could all eat dinner together and it was positively typical that the minute Fujino left, Natsuki would show up with a wound that needed treatment and a lover's touch.

Not the touch of the female best friend who constantly found herself overstepping boundaries when it came to Shizuru and Natsuki's relationship.

"Did you ever figure it out then?" she asked quietly as Yuuichi and Reito wandered off to go and find Mikoto. "Who is the most important to you?"

The last she remembered, Natsuki was still struggling with the strange set of feelings that Nao had forced upon her when she'd first summoned her guns, but that must have been _weeks_ ago now.

"As far as I can tell, yeah," Natsuki grinned, before wincing away from Mai's fingers as she pulled band-aid over the wound. "Shizuru and Nao have this weird truce thing going on right now…"

Mai nodded. "I'm glad that that worked out for you." There was a certain insincerity in her words that made Natsuki's eyes narrow, but Mai kept her face straight and her posture as though she didn't want to talk about it any more. Mai guessed that she had made her point clear to Natsuki then as she was doing again now.

Natsuki could not play with hearts like she had done in the past. There was no way that they could handle Fujino if she lost it.

-

Yuuki Nao ran a file over her nails with distaste as she watched the pleasant scenes around her. Fujino had come back to find her lover injured and Nao had almost left because of the conflict of emotions that ran just under her skin watching the two of them. She understood that Natsuki wanted to distance herself from whatever the relationship that she and Nao shared could be called, really she did. She just hated that there would never be a conversation between them about the situation between them.

Fujino had seen to that with their barely orchestrated 'confrontation'.

So Nao was reduced to sitting in the corner watching the happy reunion without feeling as though she could have a part in it. This was so _typical_.

"Nao?"

She looked up to see the curious eyes of Minagi Mikoto looking up at her. Mikoto'd managed to get right underneath her without Nao noticing. That was never a good thing. Nao prided herself on being able to keep track of people and Mikoto was the sort that usually managed to get herself caught before Nao could truly be snuck up upon. Mikoto was scary when she was stealthy, and Nao didn't like it very much.

A stealthy Mikoto was a scary one, and Nao was fully aware of what the girl could do, should she set her mind to it. She was just glad, really, that Mikoto had decided to go into medicine and not some sort of paramilitary training group. The girl already was enough of a living weapon.

"What?" she demanded. They were older now, but the dynamic was still the same. Mikoto would ask for something and Nao would reluctantly give it to her. Back then it had been a chance to live a little, now it seemed that Mikoto was after something else. Nao didn't know if she really _wanted_ to know what Mikoto was after, because the last time they'd had a conversation like this, Nao had spent half of a month's paycheck on dinner for the two of them.

Mikoto looked thoughtful for a moment, blinking her eyes and fidgeting. "I want to go see her."

Nao scowled, "Who?"

"Shiho!" Mikoto said, her voice rising almost to a shout then dying down just as quickly. "I want talk to her. She can't really be behind all of this."

Nao sighed. She'd thought about this too, how it simple didn't make _sense_ to buy into Kuga's theory about the reasons behind Munakata's child's actions. There was no justification for them; they seemed far too out of character. "I don't think that's a good idea, Mikoto."

They could not very well go about something like this without talking to the others. Nao was not about to go against what the rest of the group had decided was a good idea. She didn't need Kuga or one of the others pissed at her because she decided to act on her own. Nao valued her skin too much for that.

"Why?" The girl was so childish really, despite the fact that she was nearly thirty.

"Let's just say that I don't want to deal with an angry Natsuki or an angry Mai." Nao said, returning her attention back to her nails.


	32. Chapter 32

**Passages Chapter Thirty Two  
**

AN: So we really are getting to the end now. Two, maybe three more chapters after this one and not a lot of story left to tell. Epic battles don't take that long, and there's only a few key points that need to be wrapped up before the end of this section of the story.

Um, if you can think of anything that I might not have wrapped up very well, other than the Natsuki-Nao-Shizuru thing, which is being taken care of, please let me know. I'd hate to do what I did in _Katsu_ and leave a lot of plot bits unanswered and have to pull MASSIVE WONDERS out for an EPIC EPILOGUE.

Edit- thanks to b14ck-r053 for pointing out the awful typos. D:

* * *

_We're treading carefully around the issue of how to deal with the lingering potential. Mai told me earlier that she just wants to go home to her child and her restaurant and leave all of the heartbreak of this place behind. I found myself agreeing with her wholeheartedly. There was nothing keeping us here other than my own wish to end it, even if I knew that the conflict would end badly for all parties involved. There was just no way around it, that I could see, just the facts._

_I'm not sure that I believe what Yukino said that all this is caused by Shiho's child acting on her anger and hatred of Mai for what happened with Tate when they first got married. Duran would never act to carry out revenge on my behalf. I would not allow it._

_Was Munakata Shiho really that foolish, to think that she could get away with simply ignoring such a creature?_

_I really hope she isn't, or that she's somehow still under some evil force's influence. It'd be a shame to have to kill her. I'm not sure that my contacts would appreciate me messing with their carefully constructed version of peace with murder in Fuuka. Himeno certainly would not approve. _

_If Yukino's theory is true, however, then all we have to do is defeat the child, and Mai's done that on her own before. It wouldn't be so hard for me to take Nao up to that __temple__ Shiho__ calls home and knock some sense into her. _

_I cannot act until I know. I will not take Mai's husband from her, I will not steal Arisa's father away before she really gets the chance to know him._

_I am not that cruel._

-

Five hours later.

Yuuki Nao sat back on her futon and stared at the ceiling. Leave it to Midori and Fujino to check them into a traditional hotel where they could all share a space together. She was trying to _avoid_ interacting with the rest of the HiME and their loved ones that had come along for this trip; the rooms were simply not conducive to her wish. She frowned and wondered if they would just simply bail out now and go home. Mai was back, and they had no reason to want to take down Munakata Shiho.

Nao remembered the girl from school, she'd been the jealous, easily angered type – not the sort of person that Nao had wanted anything to do with after her own experiences with a similar woman, Fujino Shizuru. She'd been wrapped up in her own world for most of high school anyway, and Nao had made no effort to get to know her.

Mikoto had actually known her, and had made an effort to be friends even after Mai had gone off to college with Tate Yuuichi and it was clear to everyone except the octopus-haired girl that they were very much in love.

Rolling over, Nao glanced towards the door; she was sharing the room with Reito and Mikoto. She knew that Reito knew more about what was going on than he was willing to say, and it bothered her that Kuga had not simply dragged the damned man into a corner and pistol whipped him into telling her the answer she needed to know.

A wicked smile bloomed across her face. Mikoto wouldn't mind if she roughed up her brother a little, Nao thought. And besides, an answer was an answer and if they had that, they could all go _home._

She pushed herself to her feet and slipped her shoes back on. She was fully capable of going and asking a question on her own. She grabbed her coat and wrapped it around herself. She was going _out_ and she doubted that anyone would question her leaving, but she didn't want to be unprepared, in case she had to move quickly.

The coat was lightweight but warm, just what Nao looked for in her garments. It wasn't really that cold out, but with the icy chill of coming death lying all around them, Nao still found herself shivering.

She padded down the hallway and forced open the door of Kuga and Fujino's room. Everyone had gathered there and was arguing about what to do next. "I want a cigarette," she announced to the room at large. She turned her gaze to Kanzaki Reito, "You are coming with me."

He looked confused, but got to his feet. "I… don't smoke, Yuuki." He coughed slightly, "Asthma." The fact that he wouldn't meet her eyes meant that he was lying, and asthma was such an exploitable weakness that Nao would have known about it _years_ ago, had he actually had it.

Nao rolled her eyes. "And pigs fly, come on."

She left the room strangely silent, and Nao soon found herself chuckling. She was going to get the answer that they'd been debating, and then finally, this whole business could be _over._

Kanzaki followed her, drawing a coat out of seemingly nowhere and pulling it around his shoulders with the practiced air of someone who had done it many times before. Nao wondered if he was always this sickeningly charming, of if something was forcing him to up the charm substantially. She wouldn't sleep with him, if that's what she wanted, but she wasn't above a little _persuasion_ if he wasn't forthcoming with the details she wanted.

"What do you want," he asked as they walked down the stairs together. Nao had a new pack of cigarettes for once and she was tapping the bottom of the pack against the flat of her hand absently as she wondered what pocket her lighter was in.

They were outside before Nao answered him, she liked making him wait, it gave her a sense of power that she knew she could use to her advantage. He would want to know what her point was, and if she worked it, she could get him talking before she even said anything.

She lit up, inhaling the smoke deeply and exhaling it in a perfect funnel. "Just to talk, what do you think?" She was being snappish, and she knew it was rude. She just could not bring herself to care, for some reason.

"Those will kill you, you know." Kanzaki said, his hands shoved deep into his pockets and a pensive look on his face.

Nao shrugged, tapping ash off the end of her cigarette with a practiced flick. "They want an answer from you, you know," she said. She looked at him then, he looked almost majestic, the true lord of the carnival. "Kuga knows that _he_ knows the answer to the question we all need answers so we can get the fuck out of here. She just won't ask you. She's too polite."

Kanzaki shrugged, his shoulders touching his ears as he did so. He eyes were hard, and Nao fought down the urge to back away from him. "Kuga has never struck me as polite."

A short bark of laughter cut its way out of Nao's mouth. Natsuki was more of a prude than outright rude most of the time. She had a way of doing things that worked quite well for her in the business sphere, but were not that conducive to real life relationships. One could not be a man eater at home. It simply did not work. "True, true, but she knows that you have what she wants – so she's going to try and get you to tell her."

"And what are you doing, then, Yuuki," He held out his hand and Nao handed him a cigarette and the lighter. He lit his own cigarette and inhaled thoughtfully. "Aren't you trying for the same outcome?"

It was Nao's turn to shrug. "Maybe." She took another drag. "Maybe I just want to frustrate Kuga into punching you in the face. I do what interests me."

He raised an eyebrow. "Just ask, I will try my best to answer."

"How civil," Nao laughed. It was a condition, something that she had to know and was more than willing to go out on a limb to ask. She was almost thirty, she was more than able to deal with the consequences if her words somehow came back to haunt her. "If we kill Shiho, will Tate disappear?"

Reito took a drag, blowing smoke rings. "You don't waste time, do you?"

Nao shook her head.

He laughed and dropped his cigarette to the ground, grinding out with the toe of his expensive boots. "You see, Yuuki, the most important person to the user of the child Yatagarasu is almost always themselves. The fact that it was not during this Carnival was one of the reasons that events were able to unfold in the ways that they did. You could say that it might even be Munakata's doing, Mai winning in the first place."

Nao narrowed her eyes. She guessed that Reito's knowledge came from a lot of places, but she never thought to wonder if he was not completely self motivated in telling her the reasons why he had failed in letting Mai win the carnival the last time. He was still the Obsidian Lord, on some level, and Nao would not allow herself to forget that.

One should not become too comfortable around dormant volcanoes. For they wake up at the strangest times and destroy everything around them.

She flicked her cigarette away and wrapped her arms around herself. The chill in the air was growing more pronounced and the air smelled of wood smoke and something else that Nao could not place. "They were tied, through Tate," she reasoned out loud.

Kanzaki grinned slightly. "Despite everything I did to prevent that." He sighed. "She was supposed to be my princess… If all had gone as plan; they both would have died in that fight. Clearly, that's not the case."

Nao could not believe that he was still pining over Mai. That had been almost fifteen years ago, the very thought hurt her brain. Even _she_ was capable to moving on for the sake of not getting killed by a crazy-ass Fujino. Some things, no matter how enticing, were simply not worth the trouble that was attached to them.

She shoved her hand into her pocket, debating another cigarette. She'd been cutting back as of late, and the amount of time that she'd spent around Kuga had made it damn near impossible to smoke. She wished that Kuga hadn't quit, she'd rather liked their cigarette breaks in the past. "So now, would her most important person be herself? How is that even possible?"

"I believe so." He sighed quietly. A bell tolled the hour from a nearby clock. It was now eleven. Had this been a normal night, Nao would have been asleep by this time. She was getting old.

"No HiME can have a most important person who doesn't feel some kind of love for them on some level. The fact that Yuuichi has cut Miss Munakata completely from his life makes me think that he wants nothing to do with her, let alone have any love for her." Reito made an expansive gesture with one of his hands. "You could say that rejection has done the job for us, in creating an opening that we can so clearly take advantage of."

Nao felt suddenly very uncomfortable. "What's in this for you, if she disappears?" She didn't trust him; he was still, on some level the being that had created this whole mess in the first place.

He laughed. "Nothing. The carnival is over."

"The HiME are not supposed to still be HiME, if the carnival is truly over." Nao pointed out. "All of Midori's research points to that."

Kanzaki's eyes flashed bright red briefly, before returning to their normal color. "Little girl, are you sure that you want to be playing with such an entity? It is not your place to question why your powers have returned. Some of you never even lost your ability to use them." He turned and started to walk into the hotel once more. "You will be a HiME until the day you die."

Nao stood there in the dark, shivering.

-

Fujino Shizuru was exhausted. Playing politics in any group was not something that she particularly enjoyed, and the HiME were among the worst when it came to playing power politics. Natsuki was much better at this than she was, and even with all of her experience in dealing with Haruka's rather strange ideas – this evening had been one of the worst in a good long while.

Haruka was a small minded dictator, she thought that she could run the world through brash actions and loud words, but that was not the case. Shizuru could not think of a situation that could be more delicate than this one, even if all she wanted to do was go home and tell Jun that his parents were not in danger of disappearing because of some stupid little girl's inability to accept the fact that not everyone gets love in life.

They were the lucky ones.

Shizuru closed her eyes and concentrated, willing her element to fall into her hands. She needed the quiet feeling of support that the weapon and its blood red blade gave her. She needed to feel secure.

She wanted to go up to that shrine on the hill and kill the girl for the simple reason of disrupting her peace. She and Natsuki were _happy_, content with their lives before this had started. All the angst and destruction of their way of life had come because of _her._ Shizuru was not above being petty. She wanted revenge.

She rested her head against the staff of her blade and sighed quietly. There was no way to end this, it seemed, without much more unhappiness than she was willing to create. They were at a stalemate.

"What are you doing?" Natsuki asked from the doorway.

She blinked, moving almost sluggishly, not bothering to hide the anger in her face. "Resting."

Natsuki frowned, and Shizuru sighed. They were always dancing around each other like this, and she rather hated it. She wondered if there was some way that they could somehow improve their relationship when they were constantly at odds because of the strangest things.

They were happy, once upon a time.

The events of the past week, as usual, destroyed any chance that they would simply stay happy as they'd been before this _new_ set of problems cropped up. Shizuru hated herself for allowing the problems to arise in the first place. If she were better at controlling her own demons, she would not have stressed Natsuki out to the point where no one was really sure _who_ exactly, Natsuki was fighting for.

Shizuru liked to delude herself that it was just for her, but she knew that she herself no longer fought just for Natsuki. Jun had moved his way into her heart so stealthily that Shizuru had not even noticed it, but she felt the pull every time she looked at her son. He was vitally important to her, and she could not bear to live with out him.

They were a happy family.

They were a happy family.

"Put that thing away," Natsuki said gruffly, not looking at Shizuru as she moved across the room.

Shizuru clenched her fist and mentally dismissed her element. She turned to look at Natsuki, her face blank. "It's gone. What did the others have to say?"

The shorter woman sighed quietly and moved until she was close enough to touch Shizuru's cheek. Her fingers were cold, as though she'd been outside, but that didn't make sense as she had no jacket and was not the sort to purposely freeze herself. "Nao got a straight answer out of him; we're going to go tomorrow."

It was like they were signing the death warrant of one of their own who could no longer work well in the group. They were the harbingers of their own death and misery. Shizuru thought it almost poetic.

She took Natsuki's hand in her own, and kissed the cold fingers gently, almost reverently. "Natsuki's fingers are so cold, like ice," she murmured between kisses. "Why are you so cold?"

Natsuki flushed a glorious shade of red and Shizuru smiled. Flattery always got her to do the most adorable things. "I was talking to Duran." She said quietly, not meeting Shizuru's gaze.

She looked pensive. Natsuki had always had her own way of doing things, and she always had. Shizuru did not understand why her lover would be so ashamed of something like that, considering talking to the child was sort of like talking to an extension of oneself. It was perfectly natural. "Natsuki, there's nothing wrong with talking to him, you shouldn't be ashamed."

Natsuki sighed and allowed Shizuru to pull in for a hug. "I missed him," she said quietly.

Shizuru didn't need to say anything more. This was finally going to be over, and she looked forward to when she could hold her son once more and tell him that there was no danger to his existence any more.

-

The mistress of the dark child could not believe her luck. She would get to confront her fears far sooner than she'd expected and perhaps, finally, there could be some closure. She stood ready, waiting. She would take them down.

She would make them disappear.


	33. Chapter 33

**Passages Chapter Thirty Three  
**

AN: And here we go. Sorry for the delay, this story had hit the section of writing when I know that I'm THIS close to being done and yet I find myself losing the drive to write. This happened with Katsu, if ya'all remember THAT embarrassing chapter of my writing career.

* * *

_Shizuru's finally asleep. She's been tossing and turning all night, as if she's expecting to be attacked at any minute. I have to admit that I'm feeling the same, for it is too quiet here in the __land__ of __Fuuka__. I keep on expecting someone to jump out of the shadows and attack me, for that is how Munakata's child works, apparently. I hate being on edge like this, but Shizuru's attached herself to me and won't let go, so the writing angle is very weird._

_Still, it's nice to be clung to, since I'm usually the one doing the clinging. I've been sleeping so badly recently, I've been so worried. _

_I don't want to say that I'm waiting for an attack, but I'm not eliminating the possibility just because it would be too easy to simply walk up the hill and take her down._

_She'll attack; the only question is when and where._

_I'm going to try and sleep._

_-_

_Fifteen minutes later._

Kuga Natsuki lay on her back, staring up at the ceiling with a pensive look on her face. She hated waiting, but she was very sure that she knew what was going to happen if she fell asleep. She wasn't a fool and Nao had been right when she said earlier that the chances that they'd just be able to walk up to the shrine where Munakata Shiho lived and put a bullet in between her eyes.

She rolled over, closing her eyes and trying to push Nao out of her head. They were in the middle of a really bad situation, and waiting to be attacked at any moment, it was not a good idea for her to be worrying about her personal relationship problems. Natsuki didn't even know how she felt about Nao in the _first_ place, and it did her no good to be pondering it now.

When this was all done and over, Natsuki knew that she was going to have to fix her relationships with Nao and Shizuru. She was going to have to somehow impress on Nao that having a relationship with the person who is the most important to you is hardly a good plan. She and Shizuru had struggled with the issue of obsessive love since the inception of their relationship, and Natsuki didn't want to deal with that from anyone else. Nao wasn't the type to obsess, but she couldn't think about it any more.

She didn't want to think about it any more. There were more pressing issues being pulled to the forefront of her mind right now.

Natsuki exhaled quietly, forcing her thoughts to the current moment. Munakata had to know about them by now, know that they were back in Fuuka, that they'd come for her. She wasn't a fool and her child, according to Mai's account of what had happened had been able to be places when she herself wasn't present.

"A child out of the darkness of our hearts, huh?" Natsuki muttered, resting her hands behind her head and frowning.

She fell asleep like that, lost in worry about what they were going to do if attacked.

-

The sound of breaking glass woke her and Natsuki sat up hurriedly, shaking Shizuru awake. Her guns were in her hands in seconds and she dashed to the window. The street was in ruins, it looked as though a strong wind had blown through it, smashing in windows and blowing the leaves that still clung to the wintering trees up into a particularly vicious-looking cyclone.

Natsuki narrowed her eyes, looking everywhere for the source of the great wind. It was still dark, and she could see her breath coming in small clouds as she took slow calming breaths. HiME were good at things like seeing in the dark, they had to be in order to be more efficient at killing each other, but this was a stretch.

The predawn light was not nearly adequate for a search for a child that operated under the veil of darkness and Natsuki soon fell back, her face contorted into a hateful glare as she tried to mentally prepare herself for the eminent chase.

"We've got to go after her," she said, turning to Shizuru, who had their coats in one hand and her element gripped loosely in the other. Natsuki had her reasoning for why she thought a direct strike was perfect against Munakata, but this attack was very quickly throwing her thoughts off-kilter. "If she's attacking people at random, someone could actually die."

Shizuru nodded and passed Natsuki her jacket. "How do you want to do this, Natsuki?" she asked quietly. Natsuki thought that she could hear the hesitation in Shizuru's voice, but her face was a stoic mast of carefully contained emotion. She hated that she could not read her lover's face, but this was a _battle_ that they were heading into, and the fact that Shizuru was skilled enough at schooling her features to protect herself from the potential of future hurt a the hands of an enemy.

"We split up. You take Nao and Mikoto with you and go up to the shrine to see if she's there and doing it all in her sleep like Mai said she did last time. I'll go with Mai and see if we can't lure her child away from the city. Yukino can be communications here with Reito and Suzushiro." Natsuki hadn't really thought about her plan, but the logic was there and strong.

Shizuru raised an eyebrow, her face carefully blank except for the flicker of confusion that Natsuki expected. She was sending Shizuru into battle with Nao, after all, it did make sense that she'd have some questions.

"Just go with her, okay?" Natsuki asked, her gaze hardening. "I figure that she respected you at school and if you show up with two of her former classmates, she might not attack right away and at least give you time to stall before we get there."

"You don't want me to just kill her for you?" Shizuru laughed quietly as Natsuki's facial expression turned downward into an appalled and openmouthed stare.

"N-no!"

She leaned in and pressed her lips against Natsuki's, her smile clearly evident in the kiss. "I wouldn't do that anyway, Natsuki." She murmured against Natsuki's lips, her fingers deftly buttoning up Natsuki's jacket as they kissed. "I'll let you play the hero."

Natsuki pulled away and allowed an ever-so-slight smile to cross her face, "Thanks, I think."

Shizuru smiled and walked towards the open window, pulling her own coat around her and summoning her element in a rush of cold energy that Natsuki was unaccustomed to seeing coming from her lover. It was always unnerving seeing Shizuru summon her element, and now even more so, as Shizuru simply kept walking straight out the window, her feet landing on one of the waiting Kiyohime's many heads.

The large purple creature hissed loudly at Natsuki as she turned to walk away from Shizuru and she glanced over her shoulder one last time to see Shizuru squatting down, her element clenched in one hand and her free hand pressed against the large head of the creature. Her lips were moving, but Natsuki could not hear the words.

This was a private moment, she should not intrude.

Mai was waiting for her outside their room, her coat on and an anxious-looking Yuuichi hovering over her shoulder. She looked as though she hadn't slept at all, and there was a slight gash on her forehead that was leaking blood steadily into her eye.

The attack must have been concentrated on their side of the hotel. Natsuki hoped no one was seriously hurt.

"You're with me," she said bluntly. "The child's looking for you anyway, so you and I are going to lure it to a place where there are no more people to get hurt."

Mai nodded. "Are we flying out of here?" she asked.

Natsuki shrugged, "If you want to, I was going to take Duran." She turned to Yuuichi, "Tell Yukino that she's running the home front for me?"

He looked confused, "Why can't you?"

Natsuki frowned, her face was going to get stuck that way if she wasn't careful and she really didn't to explain this to Tate if the idiot hadn't already figured it out.

"I'm the target," Mai said quietly. Natsuki turned to look at her once more, "Even after all of these years, I'm still her target."

It was hard to accept really, that Mai was the object of such violent hate. Natsuki knew better than anyone else that Mai should not have to experience such hatred. She was a good person, one of the best that Natsuki knew and it was unfair that she had to suffer such at the hands of such a vendetta. Mai was the mother of them all, she was the one who pulled them together, who brought them back to life when they had nothing.

She was their hero.

Yuuichi frowned, his hand on Mai's shoulder as she shook her head ever so slightly at him. Natsuki watched the silent exchange and wished that she spoke Mai-and-Tate so that she could understand the silent promises that were being made. She did this with Shizuru all the time, but she'd never found it quite as frustrating as she did now, watching Mai and Yuuichi have a conversation that she could not be a part of.

"Let's go." Mai said, her voice firm and her elements appearing around her wrists and ankles in a burst of flame. How she never burnt her clothing was always a mystery to Natsuki, but she never asked about it. They were adults and adults were entitled to their secrets.

Natsuki nodded to Yuuichi and closed her hands around her guns once more. They fell into pace next to each other. Shizuru would collect Nao and Mikoto, Natsuki had nothing else that she needed to do other than prepare for the fight of her life.

-

The bridge had been rebuilt years ago using money provided by First District to make up for the blunders of the carnival in the past. It was new and state of the art, but it still felt no where near sturdy enough for her as Mai ran across it. The dark child was hot on her heels and Natsuki was running beside her, Duran's howl cutting through the early morning air.

Mai wasn't used to this, she was out of shape and not able to run nearly as fast as Natsuki did, but the thought of somehow falling back into that world of darkness pressed her forward with speed that she didn't know she still possessed.

The dark child chased them as though it was possessed by something far more sinister than a little girl's grudge. Mai willed her elements to take her to the sky as she pulled herself up over the bridge and shot backwards away from the child. She would attack from behind while Natsuki attacked from the front.

They'd used this strategy in the past, and it had worked well.

She closed her eyes and concentrated on the power of the flames that came to her hands at will. She held them with the practiced ease of one who was accustomed to the fantastic happening when she set her mind to such actions. She thought that if they could bind the child in once place, that Shiho would be forced to show herself to see what was wrong.

The flames wrapped around the bird-like creature and combined with the hail of bullets that Natsuki had sent in its direction, creating a restraining cloud of magical energy around the child.

"Will it hold?" Natsuki shouted as the child writhed under the bind.

Mai didn't know; she knew that she had to say something, but she could not find the words. She hated fighting like this. She hated feeling so powerless and she hated the idea that she was somehow responsible for this – for everyone's pain – and reopening old wounds. She'd seen how Natsuki was struggling to interact with Nao, and she did not like it any more than she didn't like the fact that Kanzaki Reito had followed them to watch the HiME once again start to kill each other.

It was as if the carnival was starting once again, even though he'd assured them that it meant nothing of the sort. He was a snake, and you could not trust them.

"I-I think so," she was stumbling over her words, but she felt confident. She had to be confident. She was the only one who knew how her magic worked. She'd been trapped in the dark, only to be rescued and discover that two weeks had passed. She'd lost so much, and had terrified her husband and child into thinking that she might never return. It was a bad situation. She had to rectify it, but she had no idea how to, considering how scared Yuuichi had been to even let her go into this fight.

It was her fight; really, she had to fight for what she believed in. She had to prove her love for Yuuichi was strong, and that he was the most important person in the world to her.

She would not get a second chance at coming back this time. She'd given everyone that chance then, and they'd destroyed the HiME star, but Mai still felt as though it was the end of the world.

They should not be fighting like this.

They should be allowed to be friends once more.

Why couldn't Shiho just – accept – that Yuuichi didn't love her?

Mai snarled and twisted her hands roughly, tightening the bind, no caring as the child shrieked in pain. She would not let that little _fool_ take away the happiness that she'd won from one of the most evil creatures in the universe. She would not let it happen.

"Mai!" Natsuki shouted, her voice sounding concerned.

She ignored her long time friend and climbed still higher into the sky, her eyes narrowing. She should not be so angry, but this was her happiness that was being threatened and she could not stomach the thought. There were no more second chances. She had to do it right or it wasn't going to happen at all.

This dark creature was just an obstacle in her way.

"Mai!" Natsuki sounded more desperate this time, and more frightened. Duran was at her side, suddenly gigantic and howling mournfully up at her. Mai wondered when he'd gotten so big, as she'd only ever seen him small. Natsuki's heart was a big place, after all, and she did love her family very much.

She flew downwards, not loosening her grip on the bind. She would choke the life out of it if she had to.

Natsuki climbed up onto Duran and Mai landed next to her. "What do we do now?" she asked, her teeth clenched.

"We wait." Natsuki said grimly, her brow set, "and we try not to kill the child before we force Shiho into the open."

A small mirror appeared at Natsuki's left and she turned to it, Mai could see Yukino's concerned face in the reflective surface.

"What is it?" Mai ventured, "Yukino?"

-

The shrine was just as she'd remembered it, hopelessly traditional and just an excuse for foreigners to come and spend money pretending that they were really Japanese. Nao blew a lock of hair out of her eyes and trailed metal-coated finger along one of the wooden support columns of the Tori gate at the shrine's entrance, not caring that she'd left a long scratch mark from her element's sharp claws.

No one was there, but Nao had been somewhat betting on that. She knew that they wouldn't get _that_ lucky. Natsuki was hogging all the glory to herself, again, and was off fighting the real battle with Mai.

Nao bit her lip and turned to face Fujino and that monstrous purple _thing_ she called her child. "We have to move, Fujino." She hoped that she didn't leave any room for negotiation in her voice, for she didn't feel like arguing with the infuriating woman.

Fujino looked pensive for a moment, tapping her chin thoughtfully as she nodded slowly. Mikoto was wandering around the two of them, dodging as Fujino's child's many heads snapped at her heals. Her sword dragged on the ground behind her as she walked. "Yes, I agree that it's a good idea," Fujino seemed to be choosing her words carefully, which make Nao nervous. What was she plotting? "Where to then, Yuuki?"

Nao's mouth dropped open and she suddenly found herself at a very shocking loss for words. There was no way that a control freak like Fujino would simply defer a decision like that to her.

"Let's go help Mai." Mikoto's voice cut though the silence.

Nao nodded. Here was something she could play off of to get what she wanted out of Fujino without her being any the wiser. "Mikoto's got a point, we need to help her out." She inspected her element clad nails and glanced in Julia's direction. Her child had been keeping her distance from Fujino's, and Nao honestly didn't blame her.

Fucking thing's terrifying.

It would be interesting to see if Fujino would go along with the idea.

Fujino seemed to debate for only a few short moments before announcing, "Alright, let's go."

Nao wondered if the world was coming to an end.

-

Mai saw her first, but it was Natsuki that had raised her gun up to pull the trigger. Munakata Shiho walked slowly and purposefully across the bridge towards her bound child and her former school mates.

Mai's eyes were hardened in anger as she watched her former rival approach her with the gait of someone who had not a care in the world.

"You can't harm me," The girl shouted and Mai's face twisted upwards into a contorted smirk as Natsuki kept her trained on the approaching figure. "Or you will kill your husband."

"I wouldn't be so sure," Natsuki muttered under her breath and Mai nodded ever so slightly. They were playing a part to get her close enough for Natsuki's impeccable aim to be enough to end their suffering once and for all.

The dark child squawked angrily as Mai clenched her fists and pulled her power tighter around its form. She was coming close to suffocating it now, and she could not get the insane smile of come off of her face or even relax into something that was not slightly terrifying looking.

She hated losing control like this.

"Stop!" Natsuki shouted.

The girl kept walking forward and Natsuki's guns fired off two perfectly aimed shots on either side of her head. Warning shots.

"Why won't you disappear?" Shiho demanded of Mai as she came level to them, no more than ten feet away and on the edge of the bridge. "Why do you continue to ruin my life long after you've left it?"

Mai did not know. She had no answer and she wouldn't have said anything even if she had.

"Stop moving, Munakata," Natsuki growled out.

"Do you think I don't know all about your hang ups, Kuga? Your fear of your love for someone you consider a friend – your sick twisted love affair with another _woman?_" Shiho laughed. "You're even more of a mess than your girlfriend, struggling with madness as she is."

"You did this!" Natsuki shouted, "You ruined all of our lives. We were finally _happy_, you bitch, and you brought us all back into this mess once more."

Shiho's laughter did not stop, but instead grew more and more insane as it climbed in pitch and volume. "You know nothing of happiness, Kuga!" she shouted, "You know only the lies that the Obsidian Lord wanted you to see. No HiME can know true happiness, I have seen the truth, _I_ know."

"Do it," Mai muttered, her grip on the bind tightening.

Natsuki nodded and lowered one of her guns, the one in her dominant hand. "One last chance to call this off." She said quietly, before pulling the trigger.

Shiho's shriek died in her mouth as the ice bullet buried itself in between her eyes.


	34. Chapter 34

**Passages Chapter Thirty Four, The Final Chapter  
**

AN: So here we are, the end of another very long and epic writing project on my part. I'm hoping that this chapter will resolve everything that I've brought up in the story and leave just a little bit of room for a potential sequel for me to tinker with for the new school year in August. I have always loved Mai HiME, and I would never abandon the fandom, but for now it seems as though I want to finish the Nanoha fic that I've started and maybe work towards ending some of my other writing projects that have been open and undone for much longer than this little story about the HiME.

Since this is the final section, thanks is in order.

**Lone Wolf, Fire Senshi, and the rest of my reviewers- **thank you so much for your continued kind words and support throughout the story, along with the plugs of the story on various blogs that I'm sure had generated more interest in this work. The idea was new and original when I started the story, and I think it still might be. I'm glad you all liked it enough to review it and tell me to keep going. I really appreciated it. :3

**To My Sounding Board and LJ friends - **thanks for listening to me bitch about this story and how it just needed to be done or the past month and a half. :o I finally finished it, now what the heck am I going to do with myself?

* * *

The girl fell off the bridge with all the grace of a cherry blossom descending into space, blood streaming from the hole between her eyes. They watched her fall, knowing full well that there was very little that they would be able to do to protect against the oncoming tide of emotions. They'd killed, again and again, in the name of their happiness and their own sanity.

They'd sacrificed the happiness and sanity of another, again, for that of their own.

Kuga Natsuki lowered her gun and turned to face the three women who had appeared on the bridge not long after she'd taken the shot, her eyes sad. There was nothing that she could have done to prevent the action that was now plaguing her psyche; and she desperately wanted nothing more than to curl up and pretend as though she'd never done such a thing. Killing was never something that could be done easily, and she was no more prepared to do it now than she was in the past.

A small book clattered to the ground, falling as if it had materialized out of nothing some ten feet above the concrete of the bridge's surface. The noise of its fall caused all of them to jump, alarmed at the sudden break of the silence that had fallen once Natsuki's guns had fired their last, cryptic, report. They turned as one and stared at the ground as the pages started to blow in the harsh winter breeze.

"What is that?" Mai asked quietly as Natsuki quickly stepped forward to collect the book from the ground before the roaring wind ripped the pages out of the already old binding and scattered them for the world to see. Her voice could barely be heard above the growing howl of the wind. A storm was coming in off the ocean and the sky was turning ominously black as a faint collection of green sparkles flew up into the sky from the frothing waters below the bridge.

It seemed as though the Obsidian Lord had been telling the truth for once. Yukino's close watch on Tate Yuuichi seemed to indicate that he was still among them, perhaps a little more terrified for his existence than he'd been before, but in one piece.

The book was worn, and the pages were well thumbed and filled with messy characters that Natsuki could barely read at times. Still, she recognized it as soon as her fingers closed around the slim rectangular book. It was her journal, but Natsuki was not about to admit that to anyone other than Shizuru. She closed her eyes and tucked the book into her jacket pocket. "All of our secrets," she said, not meeting Mai's eyes. "Complied in a place where she could just look and know how to push our buttons."

From behind the hulking form of Kiyohime, Natsuki could hear a distinctly Nao-like snort.

Narrowing her eyes, Natsuki glared in the general direction of the red-head, even though she could not see the other woman. It was no laughing matter, and even though Nao knew of her want to write things down when she couldn't work her way though them on her own, it really was none of her business.

She'd nearly gotten them all killed with that damn book.

She'd say as much to Nao, later, when she could get her alone.

Mai allowed her elements to dissolve into nothingness once again, and with it went the bind on the dark child; trapped and forgotten above them. It shrieked angrily and Natsuki raised her guns once more, on the defensive for fear that she would not be able to protect against an attack, should the child still be fully capable of doing anything.

She doubted the crow-like creature would actually attack, however. It didn't make any sense since his mistress was currently evaporating into nothingness as all HiME do when they die.

Beating its wings, the black crow rose into the sky, flying high enough to almost disappear before it flew across the sun. The black wings of the child obscured the wintry light of the sun, casting all of those assembled on the bridge into a dim shadow of howling wind and churning seas.

With an ominous flash of black lightning, it vanished into nothingness.

"What are you doing here?" Natsuki asked, crossing the bridge and keeping a safe distance between herself and Kiyohime. The creature was still as menacing as she remembered, even if its large size was only due to Shizuru's near obsessive love for her. Even after fifteen years, Natsuki still found the idea slightly terrifying. She was not about to let her lover go insane once more, she was not blind any more, she could see the love.

Shizuru shrugged, flicking an invisible speck of dirt off of her coat sleeve. "Yuuki suggested that we come and make sure that you were okay." She would not meet Natsuki's eyes, and Natsuki knew then that she was very, very worried about what had happened on before Kiyohime had arrived on the scene.

Natsuki promised herself that she'd reassure her lover of her safety later, as well as her mental well-being.

For now, however, she was going to try for nonchalance. Even though it pained her to do so, Natsuki snorted, as if barely cutting back a laugh. "I'm fine; it wasn't that big a deal." She was lying, but she _was not_ going to let them see it. She'd tell Shizuru, later, when they could be alone, what it felt like to end a life.

_As if she doesn't know_. The nightmares were fairly regular occurrences and they were both used to dealing with them.

Nao moved into view, and Natsuki felt her eyes narrow as the red head looked at her critically. So help her if she said anything…

She was silent, and Natsuki was grateful for that.

Mai shivered, and Mikoto hurried to stand next to her. She looked so lost then, and Natsuki wondered what exactly was in the bond between those two girls was. She'd never really pried too heavily into their friendship, instead choosing to protect her loved ones by keeping her own relationships just as private.

"Are you alright?" Mikoto's voice sounded confused and worried. Natsuki looked at her feet as she tried to ignore the conversation next to her. It was not her business and she felt as though she had no place even listening to it. Mai and Mikoto were among her closest friends, but no one shared the bond that those two did.

They never talked about what had happened once Natsuki had disappeared during the carnival. It was too painful, she assumed, and too raw, but she never pressed for details. They would tell her when they wanted to, but it was a private matter.

"I'm fine, Mikoto, I want to go home." Mai's voice and sentiments echoed all of theirs, and Natsuki allowed Shizuru's hand to slip into her's as they started to walk across the bridge. No one would question them, First District would see to that, and all they had to do now was return home and go one with their lives as though nothing had happened.

"I want to go home and hold my baby." Mai said, her eyes distant.

Natsuki knew that Mai had come close to losing it earlier, to telling her to do awful things to the girl who threatened the happiness of Mai's small family. Living with that would be damaging to anyone's psyche, and adjusting to the fact that you were mentally capable of doing something like that would be very difficult.

That, Natsuki realized, was going to be the real challenge.

-

"Can I talk to you?" Nao looked up from her cell phone and blinked as Natsuki moved to sit down next to her. They'd caught an early train, leaving in a hurry so that no one would think to question them on their presence at the hotel that had been almost completely destroyed by Shiho's attack.

She smiled ever so slightly, and closed her phone with a snap, effectively hiding the email that she'd been sending. It was work related, but she liked to lead Natsuki into believing things that weren't always true, it was her way of messing with her. "What is it?" she asked.

Nao was no fool, she knew what was coming and she decidedly did _not_ want to hear it. The conflict was over; there was no need for her to have her elements any more, so now Natsuki was going to reject her like they did in the movies.

She frowned, wondering if there was a way that they could move around it without having this conversation.

_Fuck._

Natsuki frowned, sitting down next to Nao. "I think you know."

Nao nodded slowly. "Look – Kuga – I know that you've got your crazy woman and that's enough for you, but some of us don't get any of that shit." She knew that she sounded angry, but she couldn't really help it. She didn't want to be rejected.

Natsuki closed her eyes and seemed to be counting to ten, calming herself down before she shouted in the middle of a crowded train.

Pins and needles, Nao knew that she had to be careful now. Or else she was going to push Kuga into an uproar and she didn't want to try and deal with the potential repercussions of what might happen if she said something like that so soon after a battle. They were all on edge, and she'd watched Natsuki murder someone in cold blood today. It was not a pleasant sight, nor one that bore repeating. She would have to force herself to put distance between herself and the idea if she was ever going to be able to look at Natsuki without remembering that moment.

"Nao," Natsuki began, her voice shaking a little as though she was struggling to find the right words. "This can't go on. I have the person who's most important to me, and I accept the fact that I'm the most important person to you. You don't have to be in love with me in order for me to care about you and accept the bond.

"We've all seen what obsessive love can do to people, I think we HiME are pretty susceptible to it, and I don't want that for you." Nao frowned, Natsuki had grabbed her hand and she wasn't sure that she wanted to be touched right now.

The older woman would not let go, however, and the gaze of those insistent green eyes that were so unlike her own was enough to pull Nao's attention in and hold it. She was head over heals in love with this woman, the person who'd shown her so much kindness in the past and had treated her like family when no one else had thought her worth their time. This was the woman who'd ignored her wrongs of the past and had simply accepted her as a person and cared for her as such when no one else did.

The woman who'd saved her.

Nao allowed her hand to be held, she allowed Natsuki to try and talk her out of her decision to love her despite her own personal fears for her safety, given the nature of Kuga's girlfriend. She'd already decided that she was going to back off. Fujino had made such an honest effort not to snap at her like she'd done in the past, and Nao felt as though she owed it to Jun – if not to Natsuki herself - to try and not drive a wedge into her own surrogate family.

When she'd kissed Natsuki, she hadn't been thinking clearly, that much was for sure. She'd known then that when Kikukawa had seen them kissing in the elevator, that her fate was sealed, but so far, the mousy girl had kept her mouth shut. Nao prayed that she would never have to live up to her one moment of weakness; as Fujino was quite terrifying enough without the large purple _monster_ she called a child at her beck and call.

"I will still love you." Nao pointed out quietly, her voice barely rising over clatter of the train cars going over the tracks beneath them. "Even though it's perhaps the most suicidal thing I've ever done."

She wasn't lying, either, for the mere idea of not trying to bury her feelings in the presence of that monstrous purple thing was downright insane.

How Natsuki put up with Fujino was anyone's guess, because Nao – and Yukino as well, she suspected – could not think of a worse fate than being trapped alone with a lovesick and homicidal Fujino Shizuru. She knew her limits well, and stayed far away from Fujino most of the time.

Despite all of that, however, she was still Natsuki's preferred babysitter for Jun, and she did love the boy like an older sister.

Natsuki squeezed her hand, "I wouldn't doubt it." Her eyes were sad, and Nao realized that this was difficult for her as well. "You're like the little sister – the family that I never had. It's the least I can do, to be there for you." She looked down at her knees. "I-I, I just can't be there for you in the way that you want me to be."

Nao didn't know what to say. She knew that it had been coming, but she couldn't think of a way to make it any better. She was just doomed; it seemed, to never really be happy.

Fuck, she was crying too.

Why was she always such a fucking girl about this shit?

"I can't say I won't stop," Nao said evenly, her tears not reaching her voice, thank the heavens. "-loving you, that is. But I can try not to be so obvious about it."

Natsuki smiled. "That's enough for me," she said. She slung an arm around Nao's shoulder. "It's better to just be ourselves, after all."

"True."

They shared a laughing moment and neither of them noticed the slow and easy smile that spread across the face of the tall, dark haired man sitting across the aisle next to his younger sister. Neither of them trusted him, and neither of them saw the flash of golden happiness in his eyes as they made their way home.

The HiME had killed one of their own.

That could only mean one thing.

-

_From the writings of Kuga Natsuki, on winter vacation with her family in __Okinawa__ –_

_Jun and Shizuru both had a week off from school and I'd taken the vacation time, so we all decided that it was time to take a trip together, just the three of us as a family. It's the off season for a vacation, but I just needed to get away from home for a while and not have to think about anything, let alone social obligations over the winter holidays that all of my half-Japanese friends seem to celebrate._

_Shizuru seems happier now that I've got her alone in a hotel room (we splurged and got Jun a smaller room of his own) and can have my way with her on a regular basis without having to worry about being too loud. _

_She and I don't talk about what I did on the bridge, and I think its better that way. I know that we need to be more open with each other, but at the same time, I don't want to tell her what exactly I said to Nao, or how much it hurt me to say those things._

_Nao is like my best friend, the person I could have been, had Shizuru not come into my life. I need to take care of her, and I need to be there for her._

_She doesn't know what it's like to kill, and I can tell that she fears the fact that I could do it so easily._

_I don't want to be able to do it easily, but some skills are honed even if one does not want to learn them. I think that she'll be alright, however, she always is._

_Mai and Yuuichi are pregnant again. I knew that this was going to happen to one of us when all of this bullshit was over, but I'm happy for them. Mai's one of the best mothers I know and more children need her to bring them into the world and raise them_

_I hope she gets a boy this time; however, Jun needs someone to play with. _

_. We don't know what to tell Jun, how to explain to him that his parents are former magical girls with obligations to revert back to being heroines with the slightest change in the careful structure of our lives. Shizuru thinks we shouldn't mention it at all, but the kid's really sharp and he's sure to pick up on it eventually._

_I want to teach him how to shoot a gun, but I can't, since they're illegal. _

_He needs to be able to protect himself from the darkness that lurks in the shadows of this world and his own heart. We tell him to be strong, to stand up for himself, and to never falter in his beliefs. That's all we can do._

_He is his own person, as are we._

_Ours is the only destiny we can shape._

_Kuga Natsuki, December 28_


End file.
